


i only love it when you touch me (not feel me)

by 143 (1432)



Series: i only love it [1]
Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - Author/Writer, Angst, Anxiety, Anxiety Attacks, Bittersweet Ending, Depression, Drug Addiction, Drug Use, Hallucinations, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Panic Attacks, mentioned suicidal thoughts, past!Jongin/Sehun
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-02
Updated: 2016-02-02
Packaged: 2018-05-13 23:49:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 25,187
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5721661
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/1432/pseuds/143
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Grey, grey, grey. It’s all grey. The color is beginning to make Sehun feel sick.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i only love it when you touch me (not feel me)

**Author's Note:**

>   
> **Disclaimers:** The celebrities’ names/images are merely borrowed and do not represent who the celebrities are in real life. No offense is intended towards them, their families, or friends. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. No money is being made from this fictional work. No copyright infringement is intended.
> 
> I do not condone the use of drugs for recreational purposes, nor do I condone the use drugs to help with anxiety or depression unless suggested by a doctor.
> 
> This situation is not one to be romanticized and I don't want any of you to feel that I was romanticizing this situation. This is also not a relationship that you should seek out or pursue.
> 
>  
> 
> **Author's Notes:** The warnings listed above are to be taken very seriously. Drugs (marijuana, ecstasy, adderall (unnamed), oxycodone (unnamed), and cocaine) are used frequently throughout the entire story and there depictions of depression and anxiety that could be potentially triggering to some readers.
> 
> I realize that this story can be very hard hitting and emotional and I would hate to trigger someone, please, read with caution. If at any point in the story you need someone to talk to, or even if you just want to scream _whywhywhy???_ at me, you can reach me on [tumblr](http://www.mlnseokie.tumblr.com).
> 
> Keep in mind, I've never done any of these drugs, but I spent a lot of time researching for this fic and writing this fic and I feel very proud of it. Thank you beta PH for helping during and after writing and listening to me whine. Thank you L, W, and Y for listening to me whine and complain and screech about the word count and allowing me to send you teasers.

Grey, grey, grey. It’s all grey. The color is beginning to make Sehun feel sick.

Silvery-grey puffs billow out of Sehun’s mouth in the cold air. He pushes his hands farther into his jacket pockets, struggling with the bag in his left hand. The bottles inside the bag clink together from the movement, but he pays them no mind. He wonders if he bought enough to make him forget the empty ache in his heart. He can’t decide if he has or has not. But he continues walking down the mostly empty sidewalk without stopping.

He’s all grey, no one will notice him.

Above him the sky grows darker and the temperature drops. It begins to work its way through the fabric of his thin jacket. His strides stretch longer in a desperate attempt to get home quicker. He rounds the corner and jogs to the door of his apartment building, bottles knocking together loudly. The wind blows and he shivers, teeth chattering, tucking his chin into his stretched collar, protecting the lower half of his face from the harsh bite.

The inside of the apartment building is hardly better from outside. The ugly chartreuse colored halls are unheated and freezing, but Sehun is thankful that the wind is kept out.

He jams his key inside the lock of his door and turns it, but it doesn’t give. Wiggling it some, he tries again. Still nothing. He takes a step back and stares at the door knob. It turns and the door is drawn inwards.

The man on the other side steps forward, squinting in the bright, flickering light of the hall. And Sehun is so tired and so shocked that he doesn’t know what to say and he gapes wordlessly.

“I'm—I’m sorry.” He takes a step to the right, toward his actual apartment, and the other man’s gaze follows him.

“Whatever, kid, just get inside and get some sleep.”

Sehun doesn’t notice the man’s blazed eyes as he turns away and walks to his door. He’s so tired.

He still stays up past midnight and drinks all four bottles of soju in the bag, passing out on the floor a meter from his bed.

  
  
  


_ He turned toward his lover, looking up and down, tears falling onto his cheeks. Was this what love was like? This dangerously warm feeling that took up the space between his lungs. This feeling that grew until filling up his nearly hollow chest, that grew until it made his lungs cave in. He’s suffocating in a foreign emotion. _

  
  
  


Writing is his job, not a hobby. He’d wanted to be a writer since he was young, since he’d abandoned his little picture books and exchanged them for beginner novels. In his teenage years, he spent hours reading, then later, writing. The stories he’d written during those years were hardly more than barely strung together cliches, plots so loose and filled with so many holes that his characters nearly fell right through them.

His fingers move in a frantic flurry over the keyboard of his laptop, letters struggling to keep up with the pace of his typing. Inspiration fills him, suddenly returns, warm and colorful in his heart. 

And then a final kiss of life and joy and passion, it leaves him again and he feels completely chilled to the bone.

Grey.

No more words are written.

Sehun sighs and rubs the space between his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose in attempt to alleviate the sudden ache nagging there. His temples have begun to throb in what he immediately recognizes as a tension headache. He saves the document several times over—just in case—and then closes his laptop, giving it a forceful shove across the table. It hits the wall solidly with a low thunk.

He glances to the empty bottles in his waste basket and on his floor and considers getting more tonight.

The thought is quickly shaken away. He rises and collects the bottles, standing them up neatly beside the waste basket.

  
  
  


That night Sehun struggles to fall asleep. Exhaustion weighs down on him eventually, but he can hear a series of knocks and bumps from next door. When he’s almost asleep, the moaning begins and he presses a second pillow to the side of his head, muffling the noise some.

  
  
  


It’s a week later that he goes outside his apartment again. This time, he needs food, having run out of everything except a cup ramen that had tasted old and almost stale when he’d made it at two in the morning. In just under a few minutes, he gets to the corner store and he fills a basket with instant ramen and triangle kimbap. The cashier at the counter—Kyungsoo, the little tag on his shirt says—eyes him as he rings up the food. Sehun thinks he was here the last time he stocked up on his instant meals.

“Have a good day,” Kyungsoo says, lips curled up slightly as he hands over two bags. Sehun doesn’t answer him and he goes back out into the grey world. He goes color blind as passion bleeds out of him.

  
  
  


“Oh, it’s you.”

Sehun turns abruptly, accidentally drops a bag from his hand, but he keeps his keys firmly clutched between his fingers. In front of him is the man who lives in the apartment next to his; the apartment he’d mistaken as his own after two sleepless nights.

He looks more made up this time. His hair is brushed neatly, though his bangs still hang in his eyes, and he’s wearing a dark red sweater that looks nice against his skin, even though it’s ashen. Ashen, practically grey, void of color. He’s smiles, showing pretty teeth.

“Ah,” Sehun hums. “Yeah, I’m… I’m really sorry. I hadn’t really had a lot of sleep.”

His neighbor waves a hand in the air, chuckling. “It’s fine. I could tell you were tired.”

Sehun glances at his feet, turns one up and drags the toe of his scuffed up shoe across the floor. The other man gives a little wave and he begins walking.

“You’re really loud—!” Heat rises up in the apples of Sehun cheeks and he thinks for a moment that he should just pretend he said nothing and walk away. However, his neighbor turns around, smirking, eyes bright with mischief. Sehun clears his throat. “The other night, and the night before that, and before that… you’re loud. Do you think you could keep it down a little?”

“I’ll try.” He takes a step inside his apartment, then, he turns back to Sehun. “I’m Lu Han, by the way. See you around, kid.”

Sehun knows right away that he probably won’t try, but he jumbles a thanks and his own name before turning to his own apartment. The door swings open and he bends down to collect his bag from the floor.

As he puts his things away, tucking them into the cabinet right beside the one that holds plates and bowls that are rarely used, he thinks of Lu Han. He thinks of a too-big maroon sweater against colorless skin and of striking pink lips, and he wonders the story behind it all.

  
  
  


As he lays in bed, tugging on sleep’s coattails and listening to a soundtrack of very quiet moans, he imagines Lu Han’s life. Imagines he’s the son of well-off parents and rebelled after becoming of age, thinks maybe he’s a playboy, and lastly he wonders if Lu Han’s all alone in the world. At the end of several muffled groans there’s a loud cry, and then another, and another before the noise quiets considerably.

He’s probably not alone and he is trying.

  
  
  


_ He weaves past people, struggles to find his lover in a never-ending sea. They become lost in different skies, one in the blue of day and the other in the pinkish purple of sunset. He gasps in panicked breath, leans over and places his hands on his knees and sucks in, fights away the nausea that floating on the thin pink clouds brought on. _

  
  
  


Sehun screams into his pillow until his throat is raw. He regrets it afterwards when his throat stings with every breath he takes in.

He doesn’t write anymore that day or the next.

Oddly enough, the bumps and dull bangs, the groans and moans, of next door have stopped.

He tried, and he succeeded. Good for him.

  
  
  


_ Hold me, one says. You hurt me, the other responds, clutching a bleeding heart that he can’t truly cradle and comfort. They both choke on tears and twisted emotion. And while one holds a needle and thread, waiting to sew the jagged edges together again, the other holds scissors, snipping the long lines of thread until they’re useless. _

  
  
  


Sehun cries and screams against his thick blanket. He does it for himself and for his characters. He feels sorry for them, he truly does, like they’re real and he’s watching them fall apart.

But he’s jealous of them, even while they’re tearing each other down. The longing that rests heavy at the bottom of his heart becomes heavier and weighs him down against his mattress.

He feels sorry for himself.

He screams again, and again, and a third time before he hears knocks on his door.

He ignores it, turns grey again and pulls his slate colored blanket up over his head. Whoever is on the other side of the door knocks several more times and stops only one knock from driving Sehun mad. In the quiet of his tiny three room apartment, he can hear them sigh.

“Sehun.” It’s Lu Han, he knows immediately. He remembers, suddenly, that he may be grey, but he's not the only one around. “I know you’re home. I can hear you. You can come over if you want.”

Sehun doesn’t take him seriously. He rolls onto his right side and faces the wall, listens to Lu Han shuffling back into his room.

  
  
  


That night he cries while he forces himself to eat a triangle kimbap, falling into bed and drowning under his blankets.

  
  
  


Sehun sniffles, swiping his thumbs beneath both of his puffy eyes once before knocking on Lu Han’s door. His knuckles ache afterwards and he rubs the back of his hand gently while he waits.

On the other side of the door, it’s quieter than usual. There’s no obvious sound of movement like there normally is, but he still waits, rooted in place. There’s a loud clutter—something being tipped over—and then the lock clicks.

The door opens and Lu Han looks around the edge, smiling just barely when he spots Sehun.

“I see you finally came. You want to come in?” He opens the door wider and Sehun glances inside his apartment, precariously, like it'll swallow him whole. As he steps past the threshold, Lu Han laughs. “You know, I don’t plan on eating you.”

In other times, Sehun might have chuckled and rolled his eyes, but he doesn’t now. He’s too far gone for that much expression.

Without saying a word, Sehun walks to the couch and sits down. He brushes his hand over the soft, grey material and he chuckles bitterly. Grey. If he sees anything else that's grey, he might just pitch himself from the roof of the building, right down onto the grey concrete of the sidewalk.

Lu Han doesn’t say anything either, but he falls down on the couch beside Sehun.

Sehun takes the time to look around the dim apartment. In front of the couch is a coffee table and a TV beyond that. The paint on the walls were probably once a stark white, but now they look dingy, a light grey like the walls in his own apartment. They should be repainted. Sehun thinks some color in the walls would be nice.

Color anywhere would be nice.

On his left, Lu Han fidgets and Sehun looks over to see him playing with a lighter. He pushes his thumb to the roller and the flame comes up, lights up the room some, flickers and then he releases the button and it vanishes; repeat.

Bored, Sehun looks away.

“Do you mind?”

Sehun’s confused at first, but he raises his eyes and Lu Han is holding up what looks like a cigarette. After a moment of contemplation, Sehun shakes his head and he looks away again, too caught up in staring. The lighter makes a noise as the flame is made. It’s an annoying noise to Sehun.

He can hear Lu Han inhaling and the smoke catches the light as he breathes it out in great silver swells.

“Do you want a hit?”

Lu Han offers the cigarette out to him. “Oh, no. I don’t smoke cigarettes.”

And now Lu Han is laughing, quiet chuckles, but it's bitter. He breathes in another hit, then lets it out in concentrated little O’s. Sehun watches them drift out into the colorless open and then wave as they fade and disappear.

“I don’t either.”

Confused again, Sehun’s brow furrows and he glances over, takes in Lu Han’s mischievous smile and narrowed eyes and it all falls into place slowly. His own eyes go wide and Lu Han laughs again, more joyful this time as he offers the cigarette—joint—out to Sehun.

He’s not sure what he’s doing, but he plucks it from Lu Han’s fingers and brings it up to his lips. He tries to suck it down, but it burns his throat and his chest and he coughs, his eyes stinging with tears. Lu Han laughs and Sehun tries not to be offended by it.

When his chest stops seizing finally, his throat feels raw and there are tears rolling down his cheeks again. It hurts to breathe. Sehun doesn’t want to try again, but Lu Han is attempting to guide his hand back up to his mouth.

“Not like that. Breathe out, completely, then take the drag. Just inhale it.” Lu Han pinches his face and shakes his head, so Sehun pauses and waits for further instruction. “Hold it for a bit before breathing out.”

Sehun fits his lips around the end again, breathes in and attempts to do as he was told. It comes out in choked breathes, though, throaty coughs as his chest tightens and stings, pushing smoke out of his mouth. His chest tickles with a breathless empty feeling when his coughing dies down.

Lu Han guides Sehun’s hand up to his own mouth and Sehun stares as Lu Han's too pink lips wrap around the end. They look somewhat dry, but they’re just so pink, so bright. His cheeks hollow some. Smoke hazes Sehun’s vision, but he doesn’t move.

“You can try it again in a bit.”

The mostly clean air feels better in his chest than the swirling, thick smoke. He sucks it in greedily, resting his head back on the couch. Lu Han leans closer, until their shoulders are pressed together; he blows thin bouts of grey smoke in front of Sehun’s face, watches him breathe it in.

Sehun tries again, moments later, only sputtering a few times as he exhaled and from the corner of his eye he could see Lu han grin. It gets easier each time and he feels slowly hazier.

They don’t talk, but Lu Han’s head ends up on Sehun’s shoulder by the time the joint has been shared between them. He’s still smiling, relaxed and reactions half a second too slow. He says something that Sehun doesn’t catch because his head is filled with white static and his eyes are stuck on Lu Han's lips again; smooth and pink.

He hardly catches himself when he begins to lean in, but when he does he stands up right away. There's a panicked feeling bouncing off the walls of his chest. Everything spins around him for a moment and black dots his vision. It fades slowly and he shakes his head, blinking several times.

“I need to go home. I’m supposed to be working right now.”

Lu Han catches his hand as he starts to for the door. He’s still smiling, friendly and inviting, “Come back tomorrow. Same time?”

  
  
  


He goes home and writes. Words come to him now that a hole has been made through the tall brick wall.  Then he raids his cabinets, eats everything that he can quickly get his hands on, and falls asleep feeling at peace with himself.

  
  
  


_ Wading across a pale blue sky, his tears becoming rain, he finds his lover. He finds his lover lying on pure white cumulus and wrapped in silver stratus. They hurry away from him, try to push him over the edge of the big clouds, but he grabs them, draws them in, and they both sink into the sunset and burn together. _

  
  
  


Sehun thinks that he quite likes the way Lu Han’s apartment is always half dark. And he likes the way Lu Han invites him in like an old friend. Likes the way Lu Han doesn’t take the joint from him, but merely brings his hand up and inhales from it.

“So, what do you do?”

“I am an author. A novelist.” Sehun smiles, suddenly very happy with himself despite everything else. He glances down and sees Lu Han smile too. Reality comes strolling along and the smile pulls down into a frown. “Unpublished.”

Lu Han sighs out a curling cloud of smoke, but he doesn’t say anything. He sets the joint in the ashtray on the coffee table in front of them and lets the last of it burn on. Smoke curls high, undisturbed.

“What about you, hyung? What do you do?”

He avoids the question and pulls out his phone, turning on quiet music and setting it between them. “It’s not important.”

Sehun drops the matter and slumps more in the couch, stress shoved down low for the time being.

Lu Han leaves him for a while, walks into the kitchen and begins to rifle through his cabinets; bored and almost tired. Sehun looks away and he closes his eyes, drops his head back against the couch. The stove ticks one too many times as Lu Han turns the flame on, but Sehun is too gone to let it bother him right now.

“Sehun.” Lu Han’s voice is too loud and too sudden, Sehun jerks and looks around. His eyes struggle to focus in the new light, but when he squints he can see Lu Han leaning against the counter, motioning to a pot on the stove. Lu Han laughs. “I see you’re really feeling it. You like ramen, right?”

It all processes through his mind slowly and he’s nodding before it’s fully through. “Oh, yes!”

His voice hurts his own ears and Lu Han laughs quietly, turning back to the stove with an amused smile on his face. “Really, really feeling it.”

Sehun lets Lu Han’s laughter become his own and he chuckles at the ceiling.

  
  
  


His own apartment hurts his ears with its silence. It’s easy to come to hate it—to hate being at his own home. Alone.

He remembers his loneliness as he tries to fall asleep, hearing little thuds of someone walking heavily next door. There’s a loud laugh, but it cuts off almost as soon as it had come.

That laugh is a comfort. He can imagine Lu Han’s jaw practically coming unhinged with the sound.

Even in his loneliness, Sehun smiles to himself.

  
  
  


The door swings open quickly and Lu Han grins. His hair isn’t brushed today, it falls messily over half of his forehead and into his eyes, sticking up in one spot.

It’s routine now to walk and go directly to the couch. Sehun plops down on it and he waits for Lu Han to join him, his head tipped back, eyes on the ceiling. Merely sitting here is relaxing.

Lu Han doesn’t join him though. He crosses the living room and disappears into his bedroom.

“Do you want to try something different?”

Sehun feels suddenly and wholly nervous. Maybe at the prospect of something new, something stronger, or maybe because Lu Han returns and he’s changed out of his loose sweater and into a vest top that show off his collarbones and the lines of his ribs. His breath catches, but Lu Han doesn’t seem to notice.

“What is it?” He sits up, training his eyes on only Lu Han’s face and not the sharp line of his collarbones or his mussed hair.

Lu Han walks over and sits at his side, opens up his palm and shows him a few little capsules. They’re mostly empty, but each of them have a bit of white powder in the bottom of them.

“It’s ecstasy,” Lu Han says easily, taking one and offering it out to him. He doesn’t look scared, he’s obviously done this before, he smiles and drops one into Sehun’s hand before he can answer. “You don’t have to take it. I just thought maybe you’d like to try something new. If you want, I’ll get the ace?”

He stands again and crosses into the kitchen and Sehun watches him fill two glasses with water as he thinks it over. The idea alone makes him feel a little nervous, but another part of him is curious, raising a brow and considering it. But he clears his head, allows his fear take control and deny it. He leans forward and drops it onto the coffee table.

“Maybe I’ll try it another time” he decides aloud and smiles at Lu Han as he disappears into his bedroom.

Lu Han doesn’t smoke with him. Instead he takes one of the capsules and stretches out on the couch, his legs slung over Sehun’s lap and the arm of the couch. He bounces his leg after some time and it bothers Sehun, but he doesn’t say anything about it and watches Lu Han’s bare foot bob up and down in the air.

  
  
  


_ He offers himself up to be torn into little pieces. Take me, have me, he says, coming away with hands wet by tears. He pulls his heart from his chest and presses it into theirs, ties it in place with his love. Confused and hurt, scared, a little voice and shaking hands, please don’t leave me. _

  
  
  


For a few days, it’s easy and the words flow out of Sehun like a river. He hardly leaves from his spot in front of his laptop and when he does, he’s got a notebook at his side, writing down little points that he has yet to write. His heart beats vibrant with color, pours it out into the world around him.

It ends abruptly, though. The words freeze up in his mind, stuck in a sudden winter. Colors fall out of his world again and a hollow feeling forms in his chest.

And once again, he’s crying, muffling screams into his pillows and hiding beneath the safety of his blanket.

He ends up standing outside of Lu Han’s door, his hair in all directions from having pulled on it so much before, his eyes and cheeks matching shades of red. The older man ushers him in and wipes a stray tear off of his cheek before he turns toward his bedroom.

“Hyung, do you think I could try what you offered to me last time?” He’s forgotten what Lu Han called it, but he’s sure Lu Han knows what he’s talking about.

Lu Han hesitates, half turns to give Sehun a wary and questioning look. “If you’re sure. You seemed scared last time.”

“I want to try it, I do,” he clarifies, nodding as he speaks.

“Alright. You’ll need water, though. Before, during, and after.” Lu Han doesn’t look at Sehun while he rambles on about what he’ll need. He mumbles quietly as he brings bottles of water from the fridge, as he opens one and offers it out to Sehun; he instructs him to drink as much as he can before he leaves the room.

It's the same capsules as before, clear gel cap filled with white powder. Sehun holds it between his forefinger and thumb, inspects it closely, before putting it in his mouth.

The capsule feels strange on his tongue and he takes in a mouthful of water and swallows it down before it can begin dissolving. It leaves behind a sticky feeling in his mouth, so he drinks more of the water, sets the half empty bottle on the coffee table. Lu Han places another on the table.

Lu Han takes a capsule of his own and settles down on the couch.

The high creeps up on him, but it begins as a simple feeling of pleasure, starting at his fingertips and low in his stomach. As it fully settles in, the feeling spreads and in his doped up head he understands why it’s called ecstasy. He rests his head back and slumps more on the couch, letting out a moan that seems to startle Lu Han beside him.

“Alright?” Lu Han reaches for his unopened bottle of water and takes the cap off for him, offers it to him. But Sehun feels fine, more than fine, he feels fantastic and he doesn’t need it.

“I feel great,” he mumbles. Lu Han chuckles, but settles back like Sehun.

The room goes quiet and they don’t try to pick conversation back up again. Sehun is pretty sure he couldn’t talk right now anyways. Pleasure tingles from the very tips of his fingers to his feet, winds and weaves around his body and electrifies it.

Lu Han leans over and pillows his head on Sehun’s shoulder, makes the younger tense up, but he doesn’t seem to notice. He looks dazed, his eyes dark and glassy, but he smiles.

“Sehun-ah.” Sehun tenses further, sucking in a big breath and holding it. “We should drink more water.”

Lu Han’s lips are so perfectly pink, bright against the light tone of his skin and they wrap beautifully around the head of the water bottle. Sehun reaches for his own, still staring. His gaze moves down, watches Lu Han’s throat work as he swallows.

“Sehun.” His head snaps up and he blinks. “Are you alright? You were staring.”

“Yeah, I was just distracted.”

He opens his bottle of water and makes himself drink some of it because Lu Han is pushing it up toward his mouth and insisting that he has to drink more.

Lu Han smiles as Sehun obeys and drinks in big mouthfuls. The bottles are replaced on the table when Sehun's had all he can take. Glancing over, Sehun catches Lu Han's tongue peeking out quickly, sees it slide across his bottom lip. Sehun is mesmerized.

Bright pink. So beautifully bright pink. He leans in and he presses his lips to Lu Han’s.

The elder makes a noise of surprise, or maybe enjoyment.

Their lips feel good together and Lu Han pushes back against Sehun, stands up and leans over him to bear his weight down. Sehun twists and allows himself to be pushed back. He likes the weight of Lu Han pushing down against him and he can’t hold back the absolutely pleased moan that leaves him when Lu Han bites into the swell of his bottom lip.

Lu Han brings a hand up to cradle the back of his neck, and he uses that to keep him in place, so he can kiss deeper. Blissed on both forms of ecstasy, he scrabbles to ground himself on something solid.

“Fuck,” Lu Han whispers against Sehun’s mouth, breath hot and heavy. “That was good.”

Sehun whimpers, chases the feeling of Lu Han's lips again, but Lu Han straightens up and sits away from Sehun, shakes his head. “No, not today. We don’t need to do this”

While trying to right himself up into a sitting position again, Sehun reaches for his water and he drinks some more once he’s steady, mostly to keep himself busy. He can still imagine the feel of Lu Han’s lips on his own, can still feel the phantom weight of Lu Han pressing him back into the couch. His hands itch to grab Lu Han again and warmth spreads through him and, like he had earlier, he moans at the sensation.

Lu Han chuckles at him.

  
  
  


_ With his lover, he races across skies of silk sheets. Takes and takes and then gives back tenfold. He wipes tears off their cheeks and kisses them until their bodies sing with pleasure, holds them and pleads for them to stay. When the sun shines though, they’re gone again. _

  
  


He finds himself in his room for the next two days, bundled in his blanket and hidden in the darkness, typing quickly, his fingers a pale blur across the keys. For those two days, he lives on a bottle of water and a bag of stale chips, he doesn’t sleep at all.

On the morning of the third day, he collapses into bed and he sleeps far past noon; the inspiration has seemingly vanished again. He obsessively saves his work several times over and then he throws his fist into the wall. It bruises soon after, skin turning into shades of purple, blue, and a sickly yellow-green.

  
  
  


Sehun welcomes smoke into his lungs and he feels the tension begin to unravel. He sighs and tilts his head back to study the ceiling silently.

“You didn’t come over for a few days,” Lu Han says, smoke still hazy between them, but slowly drifting away from his face. He’s showing off a pretty smile that renders Sehun unable to do anything else but return it. “Were you writing?”

It stings and Sehun can feel his emotions trying to fight their way around the drugs, find a way to get out in the open and away from the intoxicating smoke. But they can’t and they succumb to the effects. He smiles wider when they back down.

“I was writing. I wrote a couple thousand words. The story is progressing.” He doesn’t add that he doesn’t think it’s progressing enough or that he’s slowly losing inspiration again and his world is fading away again. Lu Han let’s Sehun inhale next, holds it himself, bringing it to his own lips.

Sehun watches his mouth, watches him make a tight circle with his lips and blows the smoke just in front of Sehun’s face.

“You don’t seem very happy about it.” It’s only an observation, one Sehun could dismiss, but it makes his full lips pull down in a frown. Lu Han raises his hand and lines the joint up with Sehun’s lips and he swallows the smoke down, breathes it out as a thin fog that fades into the distance. His head spins some and he grabs the edges of the couch tightly. The tips of his fingers tingle.

“I am happy that I wrote. I’m just not happy that I can’t keep writing that consistently.” He closes his eyes and tilts his head back more. Cold fingertips brush the column of his throat and he jumps.

“Sehun-ah, can I kiss you?” A finger trails down and traces the visible bump of his collarbone. Shivers creep up and down his limbs.

He doesn’t say anything, but he nods, feeling the fingers wrap around the side of his neck.

Lu Han straddles him, settling a knee on either side of his hips. He opens his eyes so he can see Lu Han as he leans down, lips parted. His lips are just as soft as before and the small swell of his bottom lip fits between Sehun’s lips.

They kiss slowly at first and then Lu Han pushes himself up onto his knees and he lifts Sehun’s head up, pulls him closer, licking past his lips and along the line of his teeth. Kissing Lu Han now is different than the first time, they aren’t tentative and Lu Han is tugging him closer, pushing their bodies together.

“Lu Han,” he gasps out, clenching his fists in Lu Han’s jumper. Laughing, Lu Han leans back and he takes up the joint he’d placed in the ashtray on the coffee table, inhales from it and then leans in again.

Sehun half chokes on the smoke that Lu Han pushes into his mouth, but he tries his best not to let it show.

“I'm sorry, I should’ve warned you.” Lu Han chuckles as he drops his head and rests his cheek on Sehun’s shoulder, kisses his neck in barely there flutters of lips on bare skin.

Sehun tightens his grip on the thick, soft material.

  
  
  


Lu Han pushes Sehun down on the couch and settles on top of him. They kiss. Open mouths meet and tongues slide together, a hand settles behind Sehun’s head, pushes into his messy hair. Bony hips push down against his own and he arches into the touch, bites down on Lu Han’s lip.

He can hear Lu Han hiding away laughter, wispy chuckles sneaking out and into his mouth.

When they part, Lu Han turns his head and wraps his lips around the end of the rolling paper. Sehun watches the cherry light up brighter and move farther down, toward Lu Han’s fingertips.

Sehun accepts the smoke into his own mouth as Lu Han turns to face him again. He takes it and he breathes it down, doesn’t choke on it this time and grins, lifting his head to kiss Lu Han.  
  
  


 

_ His lover returns under the safe cover of nightfall. They bring him forward into a soft embrace, guide him into a hectic, hungry kiss. Give it to me now, I'll stay, they reassure him, bring him into warmth. But maybe his love wasn't strong enough to keep them held down. Floating away and burning under a bright morning, they vanish. _

  
  
  


Today, Sehun is greeted with a kiss at the door, Lu Han standing up on his toes. He jumps, truly stunned, and Lu Han falls back down flat on his feet.

"Sorry," he whispers slowly, lips partially curled upwards, but Sehun spots his blown pupils. If he had been braver right now, he would've leaned down and kissed Lu Han again. But he doesn't and his only stares at Lu Han; he thinks he probably looks bored.

"What are we going to do today?"

Lu Han gives him a wicked smile and half turns on his heel, beckons for him to follow with an energetic tilt of his head.

"Thought we'd try ecstasy again. You can have a little more than last time." He walks off without looking back to see if Sehun's following him.

The idea alone makes heat spread through his body, he knows his cheeks have colored with thoughts of the last time. He trails behind Lu Han, walking with him halfway across the living room before stopping. Lu Han continues on into his bedroom, though.

Lu Han pokes his head around the corner once he realizes Sehun didn't follow him in. His black hair falls into his eyes and he grins, reaching out a hand palm-up. Sehun doesn't move from his spot, waits for Lu Han to come to him.

However, Lu Han frowns, "Are you going to come get them?"

Sehun goes to him then and he takes the caps. They roll in his palm and he's all at once intimidated by them again, but he tries not to let it show on his face. He closes his fingers around them and takes up his usual spot on the couch, forces himself to breathe evenly until the jitters of nerves calm down.

Without paying him any mind, Lu Han darts in front of him, goes into the kitchen rambling under his breath about water.

“Take one first, and then take another a little later.” Lu Han pushes an opened bottle into his hands and Sehun starts drinking it. Between mouthfuls of water he drops a cap into his mouth and swallows it down easily.

Lu Han takes one of his own and sips on his water.

Sehun sits back all the way and watches him sip his water. "Why do I have to drink so much?"

"Because you could easily become dehydrated. You should keep sipping a little." He looks at the bottle pointedly until Sehun brings it up for a few more sips.

It falls silent and Sehun looks around for anything to talk about. He finally settles on the capsules in his palm, inspecting them closely. The two capsules left in his palm aren't filled halfway like the one he'd taken before; he lifts one to inspect it.

"Why do these have less in them?"

"Those are a smaller dose. Those are fifty milligrams, the one you took before were one hundred milligrams."

Sehun looks between Lu Han and the cap a few times, tilts his head very faintly. "Why only fifty?"

"Because one hundred fifty might be your sweet spot and you've only taken it once before. It's good to be careful. Now, no more questions." Lu Han playfully scowls at him.

Sehun leans over and lays his cheek on Lu Han's shoulder, looks up to him and flashes a soft smile.

And he stays this way until the high starts to seep in and, then, feeling more brazen, he raises his head and kisses the side of Lu Han's neck. Lu Han down at him and smirks.

"Kiss me?" Sehun asks and Lu Han is instantly sitting up and straddling him, holding the sides of his face as they kiss. It's nothing like what he'd gotten at the door, this is hungry and hurried.

Sehun shudders, brings a hand up to touch the back of Lu Han's. His fingers only just barely brush against Lu Han's knuckles, but Lu Han pushes himself closer and rolls his hips down, rocks against Sehun. They both moan; Sehun shudders.

"Fuck," Lu Han gasps into his mouth, raising a hand to take hold of Sehun's hair. In turn, Sehun lifts both hands and grabs fistfuls of Lu Han's shirt, tugs it until he can hear fabric stretching past its limit. Lu Han pulls on his hair until he lifts his head and the elder settles on Sehun's thighs, licks into his mouth, steals his breath.

They part and Lu Han dips his head, kisses along the strong line of Sehun's jaw, rocks his hips again. Sehun lets out a groan and Lu Han laughs, "Are you feeling it?"

"Yes, fuck."

He can feel himself getting hard and he can feel Lu Han is too as he leans forward and ruts.

"Sehun." Lu Han suddenly goes still and raises his head. He looks slightly troubled, brows furrowed. "Is this okay?"

"Yes," Sehun gasps, pushing his hips up for more friction.

A chilled hand finds its way up his shirt, skims up the flat of his stomach, traces his nipples. Lu Han hums out his pleasure as Sehun tilts his hips.

Sehun raises his head so he can kiss Lu Han again and they meet in a mess of moans and slick lips, tongues curling together. With both hands, Lu Han hitches Sehun's shirt up under his arms, pinching his nipples. It elicits a sharp whine, a jolting shiver, like fire down Sehun's spine.

Lu Han’s hands aren’t soft, but they aren’t rough either. He slides a hand down Sehun’s chest and stomach, slips his fingers into the waistband of Sehun’s pants and gives a little tug.

“Can I?”

“Yes,” Sehun gasps, pushing his hips up again, although Lu Han is already moving lower on his thighs.

Lu Han works quickly, chuckling under his breath as he unbuttons Sehun’s pants and pushes his hand inside, rubs his cock through his underwear. His fingers curl slightly and he drags them along the shaft, pushing the heel of his palm out. Sehun chokes on a moan, plants his feet flat on the floor so he can push his hips up.

Seeming pleased, a smile on his face, Lu Han tugs the elastic band down and he closes his fingers around the base of Sehun's cock. He doesn’t move his hand, instead he strokes his thumb up and down, pressing very gently.

“Lu Han.” Sehun is growing impatient. Evidently, Lu Han’s amused, because he laughs before turning his hand palm upwards and spitting on it.

The glide is somewhat smoother now and he drags his hand up, avoiding the tip. Lu Han repeats the action, spits onto his palm again and then tightens his grip on the way down. On an upstroke, he twists his wrist and rubs the center of his palm against the underside of Sehun’s cockhead.

Pleasure burns hot under Sehun's skin and he feels the muscles in his abdomen lock together. Blood pounds in his ears and he holds the edge of the couch tightly until the tips of his fingers tingle and go numb. Lu Han works his hand quickly, twists a little on each pull up.

Sehun moans loudly, unable to hold back. He squirms and Lu Han lays his hand on Sehun's right hip, chuckles at him.

"Be still," Lu Han orders him, tightening his hand around the base of Sehun's cock. He wants to squirm around more, but pleasure slinks back and Sehun only whines, squeezes the couch cushion again.

"Lu Han." His grip loosens and moves up and down once again, and then relentlessly fast. Sehun shudders.

It thrums through him and it's quick and it pulls tight all over, hears Lu Han say something quietly before he comes. Lu Han's hand works him through it with slow, full strokes from base to tip.

He's still moaning after Lu Han's stopped touching him and pleasure's sunk into his bones, and he leaves his eyes closed even when Lu Han leans forward and kisses his neck, tugs the collar of his shirt down to suck a mark just above his collarbone.

Lu Han abruptly stands up out of his lap, doesn't say a word as he walks away. And, even then, Sehun doesn't open his eyes to see; the high is too full, too deep and strong now, too good.

"Drink more of your water," Lu Han instructs after he's returned, cleaning Sehun's belly.

He opens his eyes and lifts his head so he can drink from the bottle. The water is a cold shock to his stomach, a chill tickles down his spine and his skin pulls tight with goosebumps.

Lu Han lays his head on Sehun's thigh and closes his eyes, sighs.

  
  
  


Sehun finds it in himself to write and after he starts he can't seem to stop. When he does stop, the sun is beginning to come up, the sky a shade too grey to be periwinkle, and he falls into bed and sleeps.

In vivid color, he dreams of Lu Han curled around him, lips on the back of his neck and soft voice whispering songs.

It's dark when he wakes up, but he still tiptoes down the hall to Lu Han's door. He doesn't answer the knocks and Sehun goes back to his own apartment to continue writing, pressing the bruise on his clavicle every other paragraph.

  
  
  


_ Do you mean it this time? Truly do you, he asks his lover, tears almost spilling onto his cheeks. And they nod, pull him in for a hug, a kiss, tongues curling around edges of teeth and clothes falling to the floor. _

  
  
  


The door opens. Lu Han looks exhausted, skin oddly more ashen than normal, dark rings beneath his eyes.

"Sehun," he whispers, smile weak and eyes half closed, squinted because of the bright lights of the hall. The door opens wider when he steps back and Sehun steps in quickly. He waits for a kiss, but it doesn't come.

"Lu Han-hyung." Sehun follows after him, a pup at his heels. Wispy smoke is already curling around in the air, catching in the light from the kitchen window as it seeks an escape. In the ashtray on his coffee table, a joint burns and he bends down to pick it up, brings it back to Sehun so he can inhale from it.

Lu Han smiles at him, holding one of his shoulders.

The smoke is thin when he exhales, lips pursed so it doesn't go in Lu Han's face. And then Lu Han kisses him. Lu Han stands up on his toes and kisses him, lips parted just barely. Sehun hums into it, bumps Lu Han's hips with his hand, smiles because he's already so used to this.

"Come." Lu Han grabs his hand and guides him to the couch, sits down first. He pats his thigh and flashes a smirk, causing Sehun to flush, thankful for the dim lighting.

Sehun kneels above him, presses his lips to Lu Han's, but Lu Han still controls the kiss. It's Lu Han that coaxes Sehun's lips apart, Lu Han that pulls back to breathe in relaxation; he blows it into Sehun's face and his eyes sting, but he leans in and wraps his lips around the end, taking in his own mouthful.

"Sehun-ah," Lu Han whispers, voice full of affection. He slides the backs of his fingers across Sehun's soft cheek, turns his hand and traces his thumb beneath Sehun's eye.

"Lu Han-hyung?"

He doesn't answer, but brings Sehun in again, sucks his bottom lip before setting his teeth into it. Sehun whines, grabs onto Lu Han's shoulder.

A hand slides up his thigh, squeezes his hip, settles on the small of his back. Cold seeps in past the too thin material of his long sleeved shirt and he pushes himself closer to Lu Han, shivers with a new kind of chill. Lu Han wraps his arm fully around Sehun's waist and tugs him closer, kisses him more fervently.

Sehun plucks the joint from Lu Han's fingers when they part and he breathes in from it, holds it a mere few seconds before he's breathing out. Smoke curls in front of Lu Han's face and he tips his head back, takes a deep breath.

Sehun leans forward and presses his mouth up the column of Lu Han's throat, featherlight and sugar sweet.

"Sehun," Lu Han sighs, rubbing his hand up and down Sehun's back. Confident, suddenly, Sehun places one hand on the nape of Lu Han's neck, changes the angle and kisses up higher, letting his tongue trace the sharp bend of Lu Han's jawbone. He moans, quietly, bares more of his neck in a gentle arch. Again, he says, "Sehun."

Lu Han slides his cold hand up under Sehun's shirt and he draws his fingers around the knobs of his spine, colors in the spaces between his ribs with a chill.

"You're cold." Sehun takes a drag from the joint and then repositions it, puts the end against Lu Han's bottom lip and allows him to close his mouth around it.

The smoke settles between them and Lu Han pulls his hand back, puts it at his side again, unmoving. Making a sound of discontent, Sehun pouts and climbs out of Lu Han's lap, sits at his side and brings his knees up into his chest. Lu Han teases him by mimicking his pout and Sehun laughs quietly, and leans in to kiss him again.

Lu Han drops the small remains into the ashtray and kicks back, feet propped up on the coffee table, slouched so he can reach it. Sehun stretches and mimics him, although he doesn't have to slouch as much.

"Did you write?"

Sehun nods. Cool fingers come up and press against his cheek, stroke softly like they had before. They're warmer, now, though. Lu Han smiles softly, leans in to press his lips to Sehun's cheek.

"What's your story about?"

He hesitates for a moment. "It's a love story. The main character falls in love for the first time, but they don't realize until their lover has left and moved on."

The room seems a lot darker now, sadder, suddenly silent and dead. And, though he had been smiling the entire time Sehun was explaining the story, Lu Han doesn't smile anymore. Sehun misses it immediately.

"Is it fiction or nonfiction?"

"Nonfiction," Sehun whispers seconds before leaning in and kissing Lu Han. No good memories linger there anymore and he wants to see Lu Han's smile again.

Sehun goes back to his own apartment later, feeling slightly happier than usual. As he lays in bed, he notes that his blanket seems much more blue now than it had before.

And he dreams in similar hues of blue, faced with navy and indigo lined around periwinkle on pale skin that he's barely touched.

  
  
  


Sehun rocks down in Lu Han's lap, ignores it when Lu Han hisses and grabs at his hips.

"Sehun," Lu Han warns, holding him tight.

"No, don't stop me. Just kiss me."

He seems to hesitate before reaching up and tugging Sehun down, but the way they kiss isn't hesitant. Sehun reaches for the hem of Lu Han's sweater and he pushes his hands under, feels his way up Lu Han's stomach and ribs, touches lightly over nipples. Teeth pinch his bottom lip and he retreats.

Lu Han slips his hands beneath Sehun's shirt, raises it up until they have to stop kissing. His skin stings with a chill and he shivers, leans forward closer to Lu Han.

"You cold?" Lu Han chuckles as he begins kissing Sehun's neck, but Sehun can't manage to give in to his teasing. Instead, he moans and lifts his hand to the back of Lu Han's neck.

He rolls his hips, whining impatiently, "Lu Han-hyung."

"What is it?"

"I want more." Sehun flushes red from the tips of his ears down his neck.

Again, Lu Han is chuckling. Sehun groans as Lu Han latches onto the sensitive place between his neck and shoulder, nips it just hard enough to leave a mark. He hopes it turns dark later.

"How much more?"

Sehun's breath quickens from the tone, from the way Lu Han's breath fans over his neck. The room tilts and spins and he closes his eyes, grabs Lu Han's shoulders to steady himself.

And, then, he whispers, "I want it all."

The sound of Lu Han gasping makes him smile and Sehun feels him go rigid, feeling as his grip suddenly becomes tighter. Lu Han presses his mouth to Sehun's neck, kisses up and down, across the lines of his shoulders, touching Sehun's nipples with the rough pads of his thumb. It's intoxicating and Sehun is swept away in the current.

Sehun moans, tips his head back, and Lu Han bites the clear skin there, leaving behind purpling marks low on his neck.

"Get up," Lu Han whispers, pushing his hips up in little nudges.

Sehun gets up onto his feet, feeling horribly unsteady and swaying slightly until Lu Han takes his hand and begins guiding him toward his bedroom. It's hardly different from Sehun's own, perhaps less crowded with only a bed and dresser pressed on opposite sides of the room. His bed is blue, though, sheets a pale shade and the blanket a dark midnight.

At the foot of the bed, Lu Han stops and he leads Sehun into a kiss with one hand on the back of his neck; the other fumbles with the button of his jeans. Sehun hooks his fingers in his jeans and underwear both and pushes them off his hips and they fall around his ankles with a loud plop. It prompts Lu Han to feel lower, holding Sehun's hips as they continue to kiss.

Lu Han lays his hands flat to Sehun's chest and gives him a shove, easily pushes him down on the bed and Lu Han crawls over the lanky boy to kiss his mouth.

"Lu Han." Sehun grabs his sweater in handfuls and tugs on it, smiles at Lu Han as he sits up to pull it over his head. The thick wool lands heavy on the floor. His skin still appears too pale, but Sehun has grown to like it. Lu Han stands to get his pants off and after they've fallen to the floor, too, he reaches under the bed and retrieves a shoebox.

A bottle of lube lands next to Sehun and he watches Lu Han rifle through the box more. Lu Han stops suddenly and he grins without feeling, chuckles bitterly.

"Shit!" He raises his hand and Sehun eyes the condom he has pinched between his fingers. "Last one."

Sehun makes a needy noise to get Lu Han's attention again, plays with his own nipples. It works. Lu Han puts the box down, slides it back under the bed, and climbs over Sehun, dipping his head for a languid kiss.

Sehun holds Lu Han's neck with one hand and he scrabbles at the bed with his other hand until he finally find the bottle and pushes it against Lu Han's chest.

"Hurry," he pants, breaking only to say that; he intends to go back for more, but Lu Han doesn't.

Lu Han parts from him and settles back on his heels, laughs when Sehun groans at the ceiling, frustrated. The cap makes an obnoxious click when it's opened, but it makes the beginnings of excitement and anticipation turn hot in his belly.

Cold and wet fingers push between his asscheeks and he jolts, moans as they tease around his rim purposely. He's already panting, short of breath, but his breath hitches when Lu Han pushes the tip of his finger in. All at once, he's tensing, shuddering.

"Sehun-ah," Lu Han whispers, wiggling his finger, pushing it in until his knuckle is pressed against Sehun's rim. Sehun flutters around his finger and bites into his bottom lip to hold back whatever sound is building up in his chest.

A second finger fits in beside the first and Sehun chokes, reaches out to grab Lu Han, gasping out, "Lu Han-hyung."

He grounds himself by grabbing onto Lu Han's hand, the one Lu Han had resting motionlessly on his thigh, and he tugs him forward. But he's still panting, gasping, trying to speak between choked breaths.

"Kiss me?" It's a question, but then he adds, as a demand, "Everywhere. Kiss me everywhere."

Lu Han nods once, briefly, and kisses Sehun on the mouth, keeps his fingers steadily working as he does. The sound in Sehun's chest sprouts wings, breaking his fragile chest and flying up out of his throat as a moan. Pinning his arm awkwardly between their bodies, Lu Han rocks his hips down.

Sehun moans a second time, brings his thighs up higher to bracket Lu Han's sides, holding him tight between his legs.

Lips kiss Sehun's cheek and then farther down to his jaw, his neck and over the slope of his shoulder. Lu Han closes his mouth around a nipple, licks over it and pinches it gently between his teeth, chuckling when Sehun pulls tight around his fingers and writhes, head pushed back. He moans aloud, mouth agape towards the ceiling and eyelids fluttering.

"Sehun." Lu Han talks against his navel. The muscles in his belly quiver and tense on their own accord.

He gasps as Lu Han slides a third finger inside, tilts his hips to have them pushed deep. It's harder to breathe now, harder to move without shuddering violently, hard to think of anything other than Lu Han's fingers curling inside him.

Lu Han says something, but Sehun's too gone to understand him. He hums in question, turning his head to the side.

"You ready?" Lu Han spreads his fingers apart. Arching and moaning and writhing, Sehun nods, too breathless to speak. Through his eyelashes he can see Lu Han smirking as he pulls his fingers out and Sehun gasps in greedy amounts of air now that he can breathe.

Color slowly returns to Sehun’s world, as a flush spreads across the skin of Lu Han’s cheeks, down his neck and across his chest from one shoulder to the other. He glances down to Lu Han’s cock and he raises his hand to touch Lu Han, pushing the foreskin back, runs his thumb up the bottom of the shaft; the tip is flared and red. Color.

Lu Han's jaw falls slack and he stands up on his knees, eyes closed as he pushes up into the touch, moaning, and Sehun can't look away for a second. Loosely closing his fingers around Lu Han's cock, he slides his hand up and Lu Han's brow creases.

"Hun-ah." A hand grabs Sehun's and holds it tight. Sehun whines, displeased. "Stop, Hun-ah."

He's shushed and he moves his hand out of the way so Lu Han can get the condom rolled on properly. And, once it’s on, slender fingers tease him again, press at his rim and curl inside, pulling back faintly and he cries out, clenches around them.

"Lu Han-hyung, fuck me." He's breathless, absolutely and utterly breathless, but he's too far gone to care. "Come on, hyung, fuck me now."

Lu Han hums a groan from down deep in his chest, raises his hands to Sehun's knees and curves his fingers under the backs of them, digging them into Sehun's chest. He lines up, the tip pressed just inside Sehun, and he thrusts in with a single, slow push of his hips, sucking in through his teeth as he fits his hips against Sehun's ass.

Sehun can't breathe, forgets how to. An emptiness takes up the center of his chest and he gasps, one hand clinging to Lu Han's shoulders, the other onto the baby blue sheets to ground himself. His body lights up with pleasure and he can feel it suffocating him. But it's too good to stop.

"Harder," he demands when Lu Han pulls out and he shoots Sehun a concerned glance. However, Sehun is sure and Lu Han sees that, flashing him a wild smirk.

The first hard thrust has Sehun choking on nothing, stuttering out loud groans that he should probably be ashamed of. Lu Han moans with him though and drops his chin to his chest, thrusts into his with firm pushes forward.

A hand wraps around his thigh and another grabs his shoulder. Lu Han pulls him closer. The slap of skin is loud and dirty and it makes Sehun moan. He arches closer and asks for more in a quiet gasp; he tries to demand, but his voice gives out as Lu Han skirts past his prostate, barely brushing it, but the feeling still grabs him by the stomach and makes him lurch.

"Lu Han!"

Lu Han leans over him, laughing, strained and broken by little grunts. He feels lips on his shoulder and then higher on his neck. He can hear Lu Han swearing, can hear him clearly, and it makes his insides clench with emotion and pleasure.

"Lu Han," he moans again, loudly, writhing as he tries to find right the angle. Above him, Lu Han makes a small noise, another hiss and Sehun whines, holds onto Lu Han tighter. Each thrust is perfectly aligned, and this time, it's a quick warning, a cry of "Lu Han!"

It starts at the bottom of his spine, coils around the upper parts of his thighs, pulls taut and bursts. He spurts across his belly, head pushed back and body tight all over, moaning for Lu Han over and over.

With a great groan, Lu Han stills suddenly and then he pulls out and fucks forward slowly, deeply, grinds his hips forward to draw out the last of pleasure for them both. Sehun likes the way he can feel him so deeply as the ghost of pleasure lingers so closely.

"Fuck, Oh Sehun." Lu Han sounds pleasantly stunned and Sehun would puff with pride if he had the energy. His eyes open and he pushes closer, smiling at Sehun, dopey from weed and pleasure now. "Kiss me."

Sehun obeys without question, smiling now himself.

  
  
  


_ The lovers wind around one another; blue on pink, overlapping, mixing into purple. And he doesn't want to let go, but the sun comes up and the sky is only blue as he's left alone. His lover returns when the sun starts to droop in the sky again, but he pushes them away, his hands stained with pink. _

  
  
  


Sehun take breaks now. But during those breaks he takes trips down the hall to see Lu Han.

He relaxes with Lu Han's lips against his own, kissing him, exchanging the air in his lungs with thick smoke. It stings as he holds his breath, but he revels in it and dives in for more before he leaves to write again.

Another few hundred words and he's leaving again, eating bread from little plastic packages, sucking in silvery grey until his head spins; it's the only grey he can stand to see besides the grey sweater that's so big it hangs off one of Lu Han's slim shoulders.

He sucks a mark there, bruises it with his teeth, and Lu Han laughs.  
  
  


 

"You've never told me anything about your childhood before. How'd you get to Korea?"

Lu Han looks over, pupils blown and smile sleepy, lazy. It drifts away and he looks off, suddenly withdrawn and distant. Sehun reaches up and touches his jaw, brings him back.

"My parents are rich. They sent me away to school here. I didn't like the school, so I ran off and lived on the streets until I was nineteen."

For a few seconds, Sehun believes him, but then it really sinks in and he tilts his head. And Lu Han begins to laugh, takes both sides of Sehun's face in his hands and guides him in for a kiss. Lu Han grabs Sehun's shoulder and pulls him closer, moves his hand up to the back of his neck.

"Really, Lu Han. What was your childhood like? Why did you come here?"

Lu Han licks his already wet lips and smiles, squeezes Sehun's nape gently.

"Stop talking about my past, I'm trying to fuck you."

Warmth strikes down low in Sehun's abdomen and he forget his earlier wonderings, moves closer to kiss him again.  
  


 

 

"Sehun!"

He wakes abruptly, eyes blurry and blinking at the ceiling as he's shaken with a hand holding his shoulder.

"What?" He sits up, panic waving through him, but his head feels cloudy and his eyes struggle to focus. It's brighter in Lu Han's apartment than usual, the lights burn his eyes.

"Come on. Come to bed. You can just sleep here tonight," Lu Han whispers. An arm wraps securely around his waist and tugs him up with surprising strength while the words are still processing in his mind. He stumbles, almost pulls Lu Han down with him, but Lu Han laughs and holds him tighter.

As he passes through the doorway of Lu Han's bedroom, he stumbles again and bangs his shoulder on the door frame, kissing from the pain. But Lu Han laughs as he tries to help Sehun into bed and his laugh is infectious, works past Sehun's exhaustion and makes him laugh too.

"Sehun," he chuckles, trying not to fall on top of Sehun as he tries to lie back on the bed. Eventually they untangle themselves and Sehun falls back on the bed, wriggling until he's under the blanket.

Lu Han crawls across his body, collapses some ways away from him. He wants Lu Han closer, wants to press against Lu Han's side, but he tries to think nothing of it.

He wants to ask if Lu Han will hold him and the words come up and tempt him, but he's afraid of the answer. So he rolls onto his side and presses up close and rests his cheek next to Lu Han's shoulder, slides a hand across the bed until it touches Lu Han's waist.

It's late and he should sleep, but he's lost that sleepy, heavy feeling he'd felt so strongly before.

"Lu Han," he whispers, looking up when Lu Han stays quiet. But Lu Han is already asleep, his lashes twitching against his cheeks as he dreams.

Sehun lays his head down again and move closer until he can curl his arm around Lu Han's middle.

  
  
  


It's silent. Completely silent throughout his apartment. Sehun thinks it's the scariest thing he's ever had to endure, thinks he'd like to be hit rather than sit and hear the ringing of his own ears.

He worms his way into his only thick sweater and steps out into the unheated halls, quickly walks the few paces to Lu Han's door. There's no answer to his knocks and he plays with his jumper's hem, glancing to the end of the hall and back to the door of his apartment consideringly.

When there's no answer after a few more knocks, he returns to his own apartment only to retrieve his wallet, leaving for nowhere in particular.

But, even with the noise of the city, a great many people also walking down the sidewalk, he doesn't feel much better, some strange anxiety wriggling in and making his happiness cower. He turns back and starts for his apartment again, hands clammy and clenched at his sides. His breath quickens, suddenly, without reason, and his heart jolts in his chest.

He dives beneath his gray blanket and wraps it around himself, stays there all day, listening for Lu Han next door.

Lu Han doesn't come home.

Lu Han is gone for three days. Sehun lays in bed for most of those three days, music playing constantly from his laptop—all of the songs are Chinese, Lu Han's favorites.

  
  
  


On the evening of the third day, he hears Lu Han's door open and close and, with an ear pressed to the wall, Sehun listens to him walking through the apartment. Jangling keys are tossed somewhere and land loudly and Sehun is immediately scrambling to get up and out of his own apartment.

He crosses the few strides to Lu Han's door in only one and a half, practically leaping, fist already raised to knock at the door.

He knocks twice, but there's no answer. A quiet whimper, two more knocks, but, again, no answer.

Sehun feels the anxiety creeping in and his breath quickens.

Then the door opens and he breathes in, reaches out for Lu Han, grabs him by the shoulders, touches him, so he can be sure that he hadn't just dreamed everything up. Sehun pushes him back and steps past the doorway, pulls him in for a rushed kiss, lips slotting together and tongues curling.

"Sehun!" Lu Han's eyes are wide, palms pressed flat to Sehun's chest.

"Please, just kiss me," Sehun pleads, leaning in quickly to kiss him once more. "Please, kiss me, touch me."

Lu Han looks at him for a while, brow furrowed, but he nods and stands up on his toes, drags Sehun down so they can kiss again. The panic staves off as Lu Han licks past Sehun's lip and he hums a moan, goes slightly lax against Lu Han. Bony fingers slide between Sehun's own and he lets Lu Han guide him away from the door.

They part momentarily, Sehun whining for Lu Han as the elder turns away from him to open his bedroom door.

"Lu Han-hyung."

"Be quiet, let me get the door open," Lu Han scolds, but there isn't any bite to it; he's smiling, almost laughing. He squeezes Sehun's hand and tugs him into the room, turning him so Sehun can walk back and fall onto the bed and he does, squirming up higher.

Sehun spots an ashtray on the bedside table, watches smoke rise into the air from a lit joint. Lu Han straddles him, reaches over for it and wraps his lips around the end, smiles with only a rise of his cheeks when Sehun's lips part.

"Want some?" Lu Han asks, offering it down to Sehun. He nods and lifts his head to breath from it.

After he's held it in for a while, he exhales, sees it cloud it front of his face before wearing thin and disappearing.

"Now, kiss me." Sehun holds Lu Han's sides as he leans down, braced on one thin arm.

Lu Han kisses the corner of his mouth and then directly on the mouth, rocking his hips in a slow, patient rhythm. Sehun's hands tighten on Lu Han's hips and Lu Han laughs against his mouth, grabs a handful of his black hair and tugs, like a warning. But a tremor wracks through him and he arches against the friction, moans.

"Lu Han," he whines when Lu Han stands up. His shirt is dropped to the floor. Sehun thinks the spaces between his ribs look deeper and he sees pale green and gold bruises on his hips.

Something hurts, stings like a burn from where it's settled deep down, but Lu Han steps out of his jeans and he reaches down for the shoebox.

"Why are you still dressed? Catch." Lu Han tosses a bottle of lube and Sehun catches it, one hand fisted in his shirt already to pull it off.

He sits up, pulls his shirt up over his head and he wriggles out of his sweatpants, kicks them away. Then, suddenly, Lu Han hisses and swears and Sehun looks up, smirking, thinking the cursing had been because of him.

But Lu Han is frowning, lowering the box. Sehun can't see inside the box, so he waits, brows slowly coming together.

"I don't have any condoms."

Sehun hesitates for a second, opens his mouth and draws in enough breath for the words. "Just forget it?"

It wasn't supposed to be a question, was meant to be a demand to remind Lu Han of the previous urgency. Lu Han places the box on the floor again, nodding and hurrying to settle himself between Sehun's legs.

Sehun leans in to kiss Lu Han, but the elder dips his head and kisses Sehun's shoulder instead, kisses his collarbone and just beneath his Adam's apple. The click of the little bottle catches Sehun's attention and he brings his legs up, straddling Lu Han's sides. Cold and wet fingers still catch him by surprise and he clenches around one as it slides into him. Lu Han groans, wet mouth against the side of Sehun's neck.

"Lu," Sehun gasps and Lu Han doesn't scold him for not adding an honorific to it. Instead, he just laughs and thrusts his finger into Sehun, curls it up, kisses down Sehun's chest.

He sneaks his tongue out, flicks across a nipple, and Sehun gasps again, wiggling as Lu Han kisses along his ribs, overlapping his forefinger with his middle finger.

Something pulls tight at the base of his spine, tightens across his hips. He moans and writhes, suddenly very aware of Lu Han's fingers prodding. His breath leaves his chest as great shuddering groans and he reaches down and grabs Lu Han's wrist with a strong grip.

"Another. Quick, hyung."

Lu Han's eyes crinkle, cheeks pushed up in a grin.

He whispers about patience, carefully works his fingers apart, but he doesn't make Sehun wait very long. Another finger presses in the next time he draws them out and Sehun squirms, revels in the pleasure that slowly wraps up his vertebrae like vines.

"Ready?" Sehun's struck quiet by déjà vu. He shakes it off, though.

"Yes, hyung."

Lu Han leans over Sehun and he raises his head and kisses Luhan, wiggling as Lu Han's fingers move languidly inside him still.

"Come on," Sehun murmurs impatiently, squeezing Lu Han's sides with his knees.

"Calm down."

Lu Han's fingers catch on Sehun's rim and tug some and Sehun whines, hips twitching, cock jumping against his belly. And then Lu Han is pulling his fingers away, lining up, teasing Sehun with a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth.

When he thrusts in, Sehun exhales in a heavy sigh, all at once. He wraps one arm around Lu Han's shoulders as he bottoms out, grabs a handful of his dark hair and pulls it. In revenge, Sehun guesses, Lu Han thrusts slow and deep, pushes his face into Sehun's neck and nips at his skin. The slow drag is maddening.

He gasps, holds Lu Han's hair tighter, "More."

Teeth bite into his neck hard, scrape across his skin and he cries out, weak and broken, shivering. It stings and his shoulder does too and his collarbone, the opposite side of his neck. He likes it though, arches up against Lu Han, neck bared, takes another handful of Lu Han's hair with his other hand, pulls him closer.

Lu Han swears into his neck, leaves hot kisses down his jaw. Then he pushes himself up higher on his knees, wraps a hand around Sehun's thigh and pulls him into each quick thrust. Sehun hisses, moans after, from the sudden thick waves of pleasure, quick and fast.

"Lu Han-hyung!"

Lu Han groans, holds him tighter, maybe even tight enough to bruise his flesh, but Sehun doesn't care, would prefer it that way.

It's so much, a slow drag out and a quick, hard fuck forward and Sehun begs for mercy, asks Lu Han to please slow down. Lu Han doesn't give in to him, though. He does exactly the opposite and closes one lube and sweat slicked hand around Sehun's cock and strokes him, the other still holding his thigh.

"Lu Han-hyung." Sehun's breath catches in his throat and he's convinced he's burning from the inside out, turning to ash like the rolling paper Lu Han uses.

"Fuck!"

He wants more, wants Lu Han to fuck him hard until it's all over. But Lu Han pulls out, making Sehun whine.

Sehun watches through the haze of pleasure as Lu Han sits back on his heels and wraps his hand around his dick, jerks himself quickly. Lu Han tips his head back and moans; Sehun squirms, shuddering like he's been touched. He comes across Sehun's stomach and Sehun scrunches his nose, but mostly he’s too sated to care.

"Sehun," Lu Han pants. Sehun opens his eyes and takes him in. There's a bead of sweat rolling down his neck and it slides down into his collarbone. Pink, kiss-swollen lips part and his shoulders rise and fall with each heavy breath.

Sehun grabs his arm and gives him a tug, not enough to pull him down, but Lu Han leans forward anyway.

"Kiss me like I'm yours," Sehun says and he can feel emotions welling up inside himself, growing hot and warm in his chest and then pulling tight, making it even harder for him to breathe.

Lu Han kisses him though. Bracing himself on his forearm, he dips enough to kiss Sehun, hard and needy.

"That was over too quickly," Sehun complains, his bottom lip juts out in a pout and he folds his arms across his chest.

"Me fucking you or the kiss?" Lu Han grins. Sehun colors.

They kiss again, sleepy and languid. Lu Han lays at Sehun's side, slides his hand across Sehun's ribcage, tracing each bone.

Later, in the shower, it doesn't matter that it was quick, Lu Han kisses the hickies down Sehun's neck and sucks him off.

  
  
  


_ He starts to fade without his lover. The vibrancy in his life drains away. His world is only monochrome. _

  
  
  


It rains for two days, the sky darker than usual, and Sehun sits at his desk, sits in the quiet and types. And when he finds himself thinking of Lu Han, wondering if he's home or not. He reaches up and presses on the bruises, hissing each time, but smiles too.

He does go to see Lu Han once he loses the bout of inspiration he had. They climb into bed together and lay facing each other, Lu Han lights the joint, takes the first drag from it.

"Did you write?" Lu Han asks, offering his hand out. Sehun carefully takes it and he puts it between his lips before nodding.

"Not as much as I wanted." He keeps his voice hushed, takes another hit before letting Lu Han have it back. "This helps though."

"Does it really?"

"Yes, and you help too." Red gathers in the apples of Sehun's cheeks and he looks at Lu Han's chest, watches it rise as he inhales, fall as the smoke turns wispy halfway to the ceiling.

  
  
  


Sehun likes the way Lu Han looks while he eats ramen. He looks young, lifting noodles with his chopsticks and then lowering his head so he can suck them up easier. They're sitting on the floor in front of Lu Han's coffee table eating, and when Lu Han notices Sehun looking he bumps his shoulder against Sehun's, grinning.

What are you staring at? Eat your noodles before they turn cold and soggy."

Lu Han stares at Sehun until he picks up his chopsticks and starts eating. The noodles still hot enough to burn his tongue.

"We'll have to get more later."

Dropping his chopsticks into the broth, Sehun whines and he leans back against the couch.

"Stop that," Lu Han says, laughing, nudging Sehun with a bony elbow. And Sehun thinks he looks best when he's laughing like this, true laughter that pushes his eyes up into crescents. He looks younger.

Hours later, when the sun is beginning to set, Lu Han drags Sehun to the door by his hand and shoves his thick jacket at him. Sehun reaches for Lu Han's hand again as they step out into the hallway and he bends to rest his chin on Lu Han's shoulder. Having grown used to Sehun's habit of clinging to him, he allows him to continue until they reach the door and then he shakes him off.

Sehun frowns, but he walks with him, close by, their shoulders bumping as they walk down the sidewalk. He attempts to reach for Lu Han's hand a couple times, but Lu Han jerks it away.

Lu Han opens the door of the corner store for Sehun to walk in first and he does, but he is immediately turning back and clinging to Lu Han's arm, tighter than earlier. Something crawls beneath his skin and he shivers, holding onto the material of Lu Han's jacket even though he's trying to shake Sehun off.

"Sehun, let go of my arm." Sehun sees him glancing to the cashier, eyes widened, but Sehun clings harder.

Finally fed up, Lu Han shoves him off and Sehun half stumbles to the side. He's more frantic now, hurrying back to Lu Han's side as he turns and begins walking toward an aisle.

Sehun reaches out again, but Lu Han pulls his arm away and he glares at him.

"Sehun, stop." His voice is quiet and stern, borders on dark, so Sehun locks his hands together behind his back and follows silently. Anxiety sneaks in between his ribs and hides behind the shadow of his sternum, makes his heart race. Breathing in frigid air, his lungs expand and try to force it out, but it stays firmly rooted in place.

Half a step in front of him, Lu Han walks, idly putting bowls of instant ramen into the basket he'd picked up at the end of the aisle.

Sehun wants to reach out and touch him, hold onto him like he had before, but, out of fear of angering Lu Han again, he doesn't dare.

Frown tugging the corners of his mouth, he follows silently and he tries to ignore the way the taller cashier behind the counter rests his chin on Kyungsoo's shoulder, hands settled atop his hips.

  
  
  


"Why can't I touch you in public, hyung?"

Smokes drifts out of Lu Han's parted lips. His eyes are half-lidded and Sehun almost expects him to ignore the question and go to sleep. He turns onto his side and drops the last bit of the joint into the ashtray.

"Don't like public affection. Don't like forcing it down everyone's throats."

Sehun doesn't like his answer, but leans in and kisses Lu Han anyway, holds his jaw tenderly in his hands. Cold hands push up under his shirt, but Lu Han keeps them pressed against his belly, doesn't slide them up like normal.

  
  
  


The sheets are tangled around their legs.

"Why did you leave China?"

"It didn't feel like home. I ran away when I was sixteen. Took some of my parents money and just left with one of my boyfriends."

Sehun raises his eyebrows. He doesn't believe Lu Han, but he plays along, "One of them?"

"I had a few at the time." A catty grin plays about Lu Han's lips, his cold hands creep up under Sehun's shirt and presses against his belly.

  
  
  


_ Drifting into a dark night sky, he reaches across the stars, tries to get back to wh— _

  
  
  


Sehun drops his pen in shock. It rolls off the edge of the kitchen table and clatters when it hits the floor. Lu Han hums, pleased, lips curved against the back of Sehun's neck; Lu Han continues to kiss him, mouth closed.

"What are you writing?" Another kiss. And another.

"It's a sad piece. I was doing good, you interrupted me." A kiss is placed just behind his jawbone, beneath his ear, and he shivers.

Sehun jerks as he starts kissing lower, sucks around the line of his collar, not quite enough to leave dark marks. "Sorry, I couldn't resist. You look cute when you write."

Lu Han stops suddenly and lifts his hand up to Sehun's jaw and makes look over so they can kiss properly. Sehun turns to face him and places a hand over Lu Han's.

"Come to bed with me."

Sehun nods, once and then several times quickly, allows Lu Han to tug him up, lead him to bed where Sehun presses up close to Lu Han and continues kissing him.

Smoke lingers hot between them and Sehun dips his head, kisses Lu Han's neck and the visible knots of his collarbones. And, as he does, Lu Han lays a hand on the back of his head and pets his hair.

Later, Sehun puts his head on Lu Han's outstretched arm, curls his own arm around Lu Han's waist and sleeps.

  
  


Thick grey builds in front of Lu Han's face, but Sehun still focuses on him, watches his tongue dart out and wet his dry lips. Pink. A pretty bright pink, lighter than his lips.

"I've always wanted to try cocaine."

Sehun's eyes widen, but he forces himself to be less shocked before Lu Han notices.

They don't talk about it anymore. Lu Han lays across his lap and stares up at the ceiling, his hand falling absently over Sehun's on his own stomach. He doesn't say anything, so Sehun stays quiet too and just enjoys the easy quiet.

Lu Han falls asleep across his lap and Sehun touches his face gently, traces the lines of cheekbone and jaw and the sunken place between the two. And, even like this, he thinks Lu Han is more beautiful than anyone he's ever seen before.

  
  
  


_ His world is cast over with grey. He goes color blind, even to the pink of the sunset and the rich blue of the evening sky. Winter comes early. Everything turns cold and he bundles himself up in layers of grey and hides from the sharp sting of the ice. _

  
  
  


Sehun moans, grabs Lu Han's arms to find gravity again. He sobs, pulls Lu Han down until he can hide his face in Lu Han's neck, muffle moans and groans.

"Lu Han!" He's breathing only in stuttered gasps, each punctuated with a loud slap of skin on skin. "Lu Han, harder, please."

A hard thrust, tailed by a hollow moan; Sehun's head spins, his vision is blotted with shades of red and blue, purple when they bleed across and touch. His chest aches and then his sternum breaks open and falls around his lungs and heart.

He realizes finally what feeling has been there.

"I love you," he admits, shuddering each time Lu Han's hips push flush against the backs of his thighs. Lu Han falters, but Sehun hardly notices, moans anyway because he's so far gone, gone enough to ignore how he still feels empty when he's filled so much.

"Touch yourself."

Sehun obeys quickly, reaches down and fists his cock. And, as he comes over his own fist, he forgets that Lu Han doesn't say anything else to him.

Lu Han moans his name, though, as his hips work stiffly, instinctively, and Sehun feels special.

  
  
  


He's still feeling the high when he swallows down another pill and he's pushing his limits, but he wants to feel good, so he takes it without thinking.

"Don't ask for anymore for a while," Lu Han says from beside him, reaching over to slide his hand up the inseam of Sehun's pants. The heat of his palm scalds Sehun thigh and he squirms a little, but he doesn't make Lu Han stop.

"I won't."

Lu Han squeezes his thigh and he lifts his arm to bat Lu Han's hand away, groaning as he does.

He can't tell if it's been ten minutes or thirty, but he hears a laugh and he looks over and, although his vision is blurred, he can make out the silhouette of a person, can see them standing inside the kitchen. And he can feel his heart beating faster against his sternum, can feel panic turn him suddenly cold.

“Lu Han.” He blinks and it's is gone, nothing is there. A shiver runs down his spine. “I feel–”

Out of the corner of his eye, he sees something move and he looks over, but there’s nothing there. Nothing at all. He fists the sweater he’s wearing and pulls his legs up into his chest, holds himself tightly. Lu Han says his name and he turns, gulping.

“Are you alright?”

“I just have an off feeling. I'll be fine.”

Lu Han raises a brow, but he doesn’t say anything. He does move closer though and Sehun leans against him, head on his shoulder and breath still quick.

There’s a ringing whine from his left, like a dog, and he really doesn’t want to look, but he does. A dog sits in the far left corner, a pale white gold with big brown eyes. Whining again, it tilts its head, blinks once slowly. It blinks a second time, but this time instead of showing deep amber colored eyes, they’re white, hollow and empty.

Sehun jerks and Lu Han grabs his arm, tries to bring him close. But Sehun pulls away from him and stands up, yells when the dog stands up too.

“Sehun, calm down." A moment later, Lu Han stands up and whispers, "Whatever you’re seeing, it’s not real.”

The dog takes another step forward and fear burns in Sehun’s belly, makes him feel sick. A hand grabs him and the dog is suddenly growling, snarling, foaming at the mouth. He turns away from Lu Han and he throws up, feeling Lu Han wrap an arm around his waist.

“Sehun.” Lu Han tugs him back and he simply falls onto the couch, looking for the dog again.

“The dog,” he whispers, looking at the empty corner and then all around the room. It’s gone. His vision becomes more hazy and he sees something moving in front of his eyes.

“There isn’t a dog. I promise, it's alright. No one is here except me. Breathe, Hun-ah." He thinks he feels Lu Han kiss his temple, but he's not sure if it was just imagined. “Are you awake, Hun-ah?”

Black.

  
  
  


A hand rubs constant circles into his back and that's what wakes him up.

“Sehun-ah?”

He hums, throat sore and rough feeling. Lu Han doesn’t answer though, he lifts his hand.

“How do you feel?”

Sehun finally opens his eyes and Lu Han is already dressed, his hair brushed and parted in the middle. There are dark rings beneath Lu Han’s eyes, but he’s wide awake.

He pauses a moment to check himself over. There’s a thick sick feeling in his stomach still and some emptiness somewhere inside his chest. His throat is sore from his screaming and his head aches.

"Like I've been run over by a bus."

Lu Han laughs and Sehun finds himself smiling because of it.

"I was going to go out and get some things. Do you—?"

"No!" Sehun is instantly awake then, reaching out and grabbing Lu Han by the arm before he can get up. Panic starts to build in his chest, pulling tight around his lungs and crushing them. Lu Han looks at him, closely, brows drawn together in concern. "Please, don't leave. Don't leave me alone."

Lu Han nods and moves over, closer.

"I won't go anywhere."

He doesn't go home after that. Instead he stays curled up in Lu Han's bed, eating the ramen he makes still half wrapped up in the blanket. They get high when the sun is starting to set. With a window raised, he and Lu Han sit on the edge of the bed and smoke, passing a joint back and forth.

Lu Han doesn't mind that Sehun clings to him, hardly lets him up out of bed.

  
  
  


A week later, Lu Han offers the little pills out again, but Sehun seizes up and shakes his head wildly, tucking up close to Lu Han even though he's swallowing down some of his own.

The room seems to shrink then, so Sehun crosses the room and sits under the open window, plays with a lighter between long drags that he exhales toward the ceiling. From the bed, Lu Han moans and he looks away from the smoke above his head.

"Sehun-ah," he murmurs and reaches out for Sehun without moving.

"Yes, hyung?"

"Come here."

He puts the joint out in the ashtray at his side and he stands to his feet, steadying himself with his hand on the wall. His head spins, but he walks to the edge of the bed and leans over Lu Han, kisses him, but let's him control it. Lu Han catches one of his hands though and guides it between his legs, rocks up against Sehun's palm moaning.

Sehun eventually sinks down to his knees, landing too hard on them, but he's too eager to pay any attention. He slips his hands into the elastic band of Lu Han's sweatpants and jerks them down as Lu Han leans back and lifts his hips. Holding onto strong thighs, Sehun leans forward and wraps his lips around the tip of Lu Han's cock, sucking strongly. Lu Han moans loudly and takes a handful of his hair, holds him tightly.

"Fuck."

Looking up from beneath his lashes gets Lu Han to release the hold he had on Sehun; he falls back on the bed and Sehun bobs his head, once, and then pauses.

"Hun-ah, keep going," Lu Han urges, reaching down and curling his hand around the back of Sehun's neck.

  
  
  


_ Lu Han holds his hand out and whistles, lips pursed. From a smokey corner of the room, a dog walks forward. It's eyes are hollow, white fully, and it walks with its head down and tail curled low. The dog presses its head against Lu Han's hand and as Lu Han pets it, the dog closes it's eyes. _

_ "Good," Lu Han praised, smiling. _

_ Its eyes open and they're brown again. _

Sehun wakes with a start, makes to sit up. But he can't because Lu Han is draped over him, pinning him down.

He shifts like Sehun had disturbed him and he rolls onto his other side and drags the blanket up over his shoulder. Sehun presses up against his back, pulling the covers high, hiding away.

"Sleep, Hun-ah."

  
  


The next time he dreams about the white dog, he wakes up alone, Lu Han's side of the bed cold. He sits up, in even more of a panic now, but he's instantly relieved when sees Lu Han sitting at the foot of the bed. Lu Han looks over his shoulder and Sehun spies the burning bright cherry, smoke hardly visible curling up, and he shifts forward, reaching for it.

"What's the matter, Sehun-ah?"

Sehun crawls to the end of the bed clumsily, before he takes the joint from Lu Han and wraps his lips around the end.

"Bad dreams," he whispers, closing his eyes and seeing the dog again, the fur on its neck and shoulders stained with blood.

Lu Han leans in and kisses Sehun's neck, mouth open and hot, wet. It makes him shiver and Lu Han leans in and does it again, lips curved against Sehun's skin.

"Do you want to forget it, Sehun?"

He ponders for a moment, glances toward Lu Han. And then he breaks and he nods.

"It's okay, Sehun. I'll help you forget about it." Lu Han raises the joint up to his mouth and he breathes in as deeply as he can, holds it until his head spins and then he exhales.

Lu Han's mouth is on his neck again and then he slides into Sehun's lap, slings an arm over Sehun's shoulder. Tension spills from him into the air around them, but it’s replaced as Lu Han dips his head, sucks the points of his collarbones and reaches up under Sehun's shirt to brush thumbs across his nipples. He moans and Lu Han raises his head, kisses him with a mouthful of smoke, pushes it forward with his tongue.

Greedy, he carelessly sucks it down.

"Thank you, hyung," he whispers and takes his shirt off.

  
  
  


Smoke is grey and Lu Han is too. It's a sweet shade of grey that makes Sehun happy.

Lu Han blows neat little rings that Sehun tries to copy after his next drag. He fails no matter how many times Lu Han explains it to him and demonstrates for him. They laugh, falling over against one another, their shoulders pressing together.

"Have you worked on your book any lately?"

Sehun groans and hides his face against the crook of his elbow.

"No, I haven't worked on it in... four days?" It's a guess, but the closest guess that Sehun has. He remembers that the sun was setting as he wrote about the new love in his character's life.

"Are you close to finishing it?"

Sehun's laughter comes out in harsh spurts, smoke stinging his throat as he coughs on it.

"I'm not anywhere near the end. This story has turned into so much more than I planned."

Feeling across the couch cushion, Sehun takes Lu Han's hand and he gives it a squeeze. The burn in his dry throat lessens and he turns to look at Lu Han, watches him knock dead ashes into the ashtray sitting on the coffee table.

"Let's go to bed," Lu Han says, rubbing the fire out.

The sun is still up and Sehun thinks, without looking at a clock, that the sun will be setting in a couple hours. But he still gets up with Lu Han and follows him to bed, climbing under the covers and letting Lu Han curl behind him. Lu Han holds his hand and Sehun smiles.

  
  
  


Sehun wakes up several hours later, feeling suddenly colder. Some foreign feeling wells up in him and he reaches back and feels across the sheets for Lu Han.

He’s not there though. Sehun finds himself only a little surprised. The sheets under his palm are already cool and he draws his arm back against the warmth of his chest. Across the room, on Lu Han’s dresser, the bright red lights of the digital clock read  _ 3:22 _ .

He gets out of bed stumbling, limbs still heavy with sleep; he nearly walks into the dresser and he bumps his hip against the doorframe as he searches for Lu Han.

Sehun finds Lu Han sitting on the edge of the couch leaning over the coffee table and Sehun stumbles forward and plops down beside him. The elder turns to him and suddenly takes Sehun by the hair before kissing him, licking into his mouth right away. He presses his hand flat to Lu Han's chest, but doesn't push him away.

“I was hoping you’d be up soon,” Lu Han says and Sehun furrows his brow. Lu Han only chuckles at him. “It wouldn’t be fun if I did it alone.”

Sehun is still confused, but he leans up and blinks several times before his eyes ars clear. On the table there are several straight lines of powdery white, the light from the kitchen catching it and lighting it up. He knows what it is immediately, vaguely remembers Lu Han talking about it once.

“I want you to do it with me.”

Taken aback, Sehun flounders and he glances back and forth from Lu Han to the cocaine sitting on the table. Lu Han must think this is funny, because he laughs and kisses Sehun again, briefly and without tongue. It’s hard to enjoy the kiss, even when Lu Han is rubbing a hand up his thigh. Nervousness bounces against the walls of his ribcage.

“Come on, Sehun.”

Lu Han turns away and Sehun’s eyes follow him to the table as he leans down. Sehun hears him inhaling heavily a few times. When he sits up he passes a little straw to Sehun and smiles.

He hesitates for a few beats, leaning down slowly.

It stings when Sehun first breathes in and he coughs, gags, sitting up straight to breathe in harshly through his nose. He gasps greedily once the sting lessens. Lu Han gives him a nudge towards the unfinished line and he leans back down again, trying again to take it all in one go. It results in the same stinging and a hiss of pain and Lu Han pushes a glass of water toward him.

“Dip your pinky in. Put it in your nose, it’ll help.”

It’s considerably easier after he’s followed Lu Han’s instructions. By the time he breathes in the final half of the line, it’s beginning to set in and all at once, he feels awake. Lu Han leans forward and he rubs his finger across the light dust that sticks to the table.

“Open your mouth.”

Sehun looks over and he eyes Lu Han’s hand warily, though he does open his mouth, suddenly curious beyond belief. It’s unlike him, but he stays still, he doesn’t recoil when Lu Han leans forward and rubs a finger along his gums. They tingle moments later and then go numb and he can’t stop prodding them with his tongue.

Something drips in the back of his throat and it makes him feel sick, but he doesn’t say anything about it to Lu Han.

“How do you feel?”

“I don’t know,” he answers dumbly, trying to sort through his thoughts that race rapidly through his mind. With his head tipped back, Lu Han laughs at the ceiling. Sense of shame slowly bleeds from Sehun and he doesn’t blush.

“I want to write.” His decision is sudden and he stands and hurries to the table. He bumps his toes against one of the table legs in his haste to find a notebook, but he’s too busy flipping to a blank page to notice. The cap to his pen falls to the floor; he doesn’t care.

He can still hear Lu Han laughing across the room.

  
  
  


Sehun's nose burns and there's a bad taste in the back of his throat and some odd anxiety resting, lying dormant until he wanders into the kitchen without Lu Han. He retreats to the bed and curls up against Lu Han's side, not caring that he doesn't reach out or lean into the touch.

But later Lu Han wakes up asking if he's alright, asking how he feels. He slings his legs off his side of the bed and stretches, peers over his shoulder at Sehun as he speaks.

"I feel... slow and nervous. My nose burns." He waits a second, but Lu Han doesn't say anything, so he pulls himself closer and presses his mouth to the small of Lu Han's back. "Hyung."

Lu Han arches away from the touch, stretches again, and then stands up.

"I'll be back. Want something to eat?"

Sehun takes check of himself and there's an ache of hunger, but sick swirls beneath its surface, so he shakes his head and collapses back into bed. Alone now, he curls up on Lu Han's side of the bed and presses his face into Lu Han's pillow, clutches handfuls of it. He almost falls asleep again, but Lu Han doesn't let him.

"Hun-ah." A hand slides up his back, grips his shoulder and gives him a gentle shake. "Sit up, take this."

He twists his torso and pushes himself halfway up on one arm, holds out his other hand. The pill Lu Han gives him is oblong, bright blue, and he doesn't even bother asking what it is before he drops it onto his tongue and takes the water bottle from Lu Han.

"This will pick you up," Lu Han says, smiling now.

It does pick him up. It wakes him up and makes him talk. It makes him dash from the bedroom and into the kitchen for his notebook.

  
  
  


_ Suddenly, he's bright again. The clouds roll away and he seeps in color from the new lover beneath him. He takes and takes until he's red and blue and yellow all over and his lover doesn't leave him, because it's easy to love them. _

  
  
  


"I'll be away for a few days, so you'll have to go home for a bit."

Letting out a high whine, Sehun rolls against Lu Han's side and hides his face against Lu Han's shoulder.

"Can't I come with you?"

Lu Han laughs at him, shakes his head, and Sehun whines again, turns the corners of his mouth down in an exaggerated frown. A hand cradles the crown of his head and fingers brush through his hair.

"No, I have to go alone."

Sehun doesn't like it, but he returns to his own apartment and lies sprawled across his bed, eyes on the ceiling, bored, for hours.

  
  
  


_ When his lover is away his world is less vibrant, less noisy, less happy. He has nothing but silence and his own thoughts and he distracts himself with dark skies, stars invisible because of the bright lights of the city. _

  
  
  


"Fuck, Sehun."

Lu Han straddles him, ruts against him roughly, grabs him by the hair to guide him into a kiss. He whines, slumps against Lu Han, drops his hands away from Lu Han's sides.

Emotion rises up from deep under arousal and it floats up into his chest, nests between his heart and lungs, pushes against them both. It hurts, but it's a sweet pain and he can't get enough of it. He's touching Lu Han again now, wrapping an arm around his waist to pull him closer and lifting his own hips.

"Hurry up and fuck me. Hurry up!"

He falls back on the bed and Lu Han nods quickly, gets off of him to reach beneath the bed. Without being told, Sehun starts taking his clothes off, drops his shirt off the side of the bed and shimmies out of his pants, kicks them away.

Lu Han tosses lube and a condom onto the bed and Sehun wets his fingers, props a leg so he can reach better. He cares little for teasing, pushes a finger in, hissing as he does, but he tilts his hips down anyway and he hears Lu Han moan.

"Hun-ah." He hears and he's smug, looks over at Lu Han smirking.

He falters when he sees Lu Han, when he sees bruises low around his neck, dark on the sides and bruises adorning his bony hips. They're not dark, probably days old, but still noticeable on his light skin. Sehun is only mildly bothered, though, his attention is drawn away and he watches Lu Han stroke his cock.

Lu Han's jaw falls slack and his lips part as Sehun overlaps two fingers and presses them in. They both moan.

"Lu Han-hyung, please."

"Yes," he says as he crawls across the bed.

Lu Han settles between his thighs and he takes the bottle of lube, slides his knobby fingers in beside Sehun's.

Sehun swears and stops moving his fingers, lets Lu Han do it because he curls his fingers just right. With his mouth open and eyes squeezed shut, he shakes, trembles, but Lu Han says nothing, sliding in another finger and another when he's ready. His thick moans give way to a pitched whine; another finger starts to press in carefully next to the others.

"No! Your cock." Sehun feels himself grow hotter because of his own words. He pulls his own fingers out, groaning, and he pulls Lu Han's wrist.

Lu Han laughs at him. "Alright, alright. Get up."

At first, he doesn't move, he lies there and lets the words process, but then he stands up onto his knees. Lu Han takes Sehun by the hips and pulls him back, so he can kiss the nape of Sehun's neck, so he can line up and tease Sehun.

Sehun leans forward and braces himself against the wall, palms flat to the dingy paint. Thin lines are stripped away by Sehun's nails as Lu Han pushes into him steadily. Lu Han's fingers curl around his hips and Sehun moans, works his hips back until nails are ripping across the rise of his hipbone.

His head spins and he leans in more, his arms trembling. Lu Han is not gentle with him, holds him roughly by the hips, and later by his shoulders, and fucks him. He trembles so much his arms give out and he almost fails to catch himself.

"Sehun-ah," Lu Han purrs, sliding his hand across Sehun's hip to cradle his cock in a careful palm.

A whine is Sehun's answer, his hips jerking is a plea. And Lu Han gives into him quickly, strokes him until they're coming nearly at the same time.

  
  
  


They fall into bed together, wrapped around one another, hot and sweaty, but Sehun doesn't mind. He smiles against Lu Han's shoulder, giggles, laughs.

"I missed you." Sehun kisses the prominent bones of Lu Han's shoulder. He props his chin there and looks up at Lu Han. "Did you miss me?"

“I only miss you when I’m high,” Lu Han confesses, blowing smoke into Sehun’s face. He sneers and takes another drag, holding it in for longer before exhaling it slowly.

Sehun watches it fade in the air.

“I don’t believe you.” Sehun doesn’t believe him. Fear still rises up, but Sehun lets it settle.

Lu Han turns back to him and he frowns, raises the joint to his lips a final time. He exhales in Sehun’s face and Sehun closes his eyes. Then Lu Han rolls onto his side and he kisses Sehun, kisses him hungrily, with both hands holding his face, trying to pull him even closer. And Sehun crawls into his lap, takes the bitter taste from his tongue with greed.

"I'm going to break you. You'll shatter into a thousand pieces." Lu Han is serious, there's no trace of joking. But it's so clear to Sehun that it's a lie. Sehun leans in again and kisses Lu Han, holds Lu Han's face in his hands.

Sehun is smiling softly when they part. "You couldn't do that."

“Fuck, you’re so young and stupid. I fucking love it,” Lu Han whispers and Sehun takes it as “I love you.”

The elder kisses his jaw, bites down on the juncture of Sehun’s neck and shoulder. It probably bruises immediately, but Sehun moans and he lifts his gaze, focuses on the dingy paint on the walls. Lu Han pushes him up, sits up with him and Lu Han kisses Sehun’s skin, traces his tongue around the edges of pink nipples; he chuckles, lips against Sehun’s sternum, as his skin pulls tight with goosebumps and his nipples peak.

He leaves himself to be ruined without worry. Lu Han wouldn’t ruin him; couldn’t ruin him.

"I want you to ride me."

"Anything."

  
  
  


Sehun sits between Lu Han's legs, rests his head on Lu Han's thigh.

"Did you write a lot while I was away?"

He frowns and lifts his head up, shaking it from side to side, a little over-exaggerated. A hand meets his cheek and he presses into it.

"What's happening?"

"The main character has just gotten over his lost love, he's going after the new one." Taking a breath, and letting it out as a sigh, Sehun looks down at his lap and he leans away from Lu Han's hand. "He's determined not to let his new love get away."

Smoke fans out in front of his face and he breathes it in, tips his head back with a groan.

"Tell me about this great love you had, little one. The one you based that story of yours on." His voice is almost cold and Sehun wants to curl in on himself. For once, he's truly naked and it feels overwhelming, scary.

"He was my first love, until now, my only love. He was busy preparing for dance recitals and I was always lost somewhere in my newest plot of the week. And, one day, I guess, he was tired of being ignored and replaced by people that didn't exist." Sehun reaches over for Lu Han's hand and he guides it up, takes a hit and holds it long enough to make his head spin, long enough for his vision to spot with black. "And then I was alone. I had no one. No friends, no family and I realized how much I loved him. We saw each other a few more times, but there was already someone else then."

Sehun chuckles bitterly, drops his head back on the couch, "The feeling of being forgotten is something I'll never get used to."

He first feels a hand on his, frozen fingers touching his own, and then Lu Han is climbing into his lap, holding his jaw and bringing him in for a kiss. The same hand that had touched him gently pushes under his shirt and nails sting his skin, the callused tips of fingers rub his nipples.

He's moaning now, Lu Han's hips rocking down, but it's better than the quiet.

  
  
  


Sehun presses against a hickie on his stomach and another on his hip. The ache lingers even after he's lifted his finger away, but he likes it, smiles.

"Stop doing that," Lu Han says, abrupt in the content quiet that had surrounded Sehun. His hair is wet, dripping water onto his shoulders, wetting the material of his long sleeved shirt. Heat collects in Sehun's cheeks, but he smiles and doesn't look away.

Lu Han joins him in bed, sits on the edge, his back to Sehun. But Sehun doesn't mind, he wriggles across the bed and kisses Lu Han's lower back.

Lu Han shifts away from him. "What are you doing?"

“What am I to you?” Sehun asks as Lu Han leans over. His actions are hidden from Sehun, but the younger still knows what he’s doing; he’s grown accustomed to the soft sound of skin on rolling paper.

The sound stops for a moment, but it returns moments later. Distracted by near silence, Sehun watches the knobs of Lu Han’s elbow as he moves.

“What do you want to be?”

Lu Han turns to face him, falls over on his side so they are nose-to-nose.

“Anything.”

There’s a bland silence again. It flies up into the air and then drifts down slowly, blankets them comfortably.

Lu Han’s eyes look for something, flicker across the points of Sehun’s face until they settle on his lips.

Sehun goes to lean in, but Lu Han turns away from him, twists his upper body and reaches along his side for the lighter and joint. The lighter is stubborn, needs a few flicks before it finally lights with a strong flame and Lu Han blows long curls of smoke into Sehun’s face. He breathes in, holds it for a second, and then breathes out evenly.

“We were having a moment,” Sehun whispers, reaching out and placing a warm hand on Lu Han’s cold, bare chest.

“People like me don’t deserve moments. Especially with people like you.”

Lu Han turns fully onto his back again and blows smoke rings at the ceiling. The cherry burns brighter as Lu Han sucks in.

“I want moments with you.”

  
  
  


Sehun takes handfuls of the sweater Lu Han is wearing, just to grab something, just to ground himself. Teeth press into his bottom lip and he gasps against Lu Han's mouth, tries to get closer to him, even though he's already in Lu Han's lap, their chests pressed flush together. Lu Han tugs his lip as he rests his head back against the wall.

"I'll be leaving again tomorrow. You shouldn't stay the night."

Sehun's heart falls from the height it had flown up. He tries not to let it show, but he fails and Lu Han leans in, kisses him. Again teeth are nipping his bottom lip, but Sehun feels warm again and his heart floats back up, overflows with love.

"I won't be gone long. Two days, just two."

  
  
  


Lu Han returns two days later.

Sehun hurries to him, slips inside his apartment and kisses. But at the first press of lips, he turns pliant and he lets Lu Han hold him, grab him, lead him back to the couch. They lie together, Lu Han pushing Sehun into the couch cushion and kissing him languidly, hands up under Sehun's shirt just to touch him.

It's dark, quiet, but comfortable. The kitchen window is open as usual, light from the partial overcast sky flooding in, the wind making the wispy white curtains wave.

Lu Han fits his lips around the end of the joint, inhales from it strongly, cheeks dipping inwards. He rests his head back as he exhales, licks his lips, and Sehun watches smoke rise into the air, lets the sight settle warm in his stomach.

Lu Han sighs. Sehun crawls across the couch and sits in Lu Han's lap, twists his hips and lowers his mouth to Lu Han's.

He takes handfuls of Lu Han's newly bleached and dyed blonde hair. It's coarse between his fingers, dry, not the silk it had been when it was still black, but he doesn't care; Lu Han's mouth is soft and warm and makes up for it. Lu Han is hard against Sehun's thigh and he slips off the couch and falls to his knees.

He reaches for Lu Han's pants, gives him a questioning look and, smirking and dazed, Lu Han nods.

Lu Han strokes his cheeks and combs his hair and, even though Lu Han's cock is heavy against his tongue, Sehun feels loved.

  
  
  


Lu Han takes him by the chin and he opens his mouth, let's Lu Han lay the blue pill on his tongue. Washing it down with water, he falls back against Lu Han's bed, naked still, waits for the high to swallow him whole.

Before it does, though, Lu Han takes his wrist and tugs him up, pulls him along into the bathroom.

"Come on," Lu Han says, stepping into the shower and turning on the water. It's cold, Sehun knows that before he gets because Lu Han shivers and goosebumps quickly rise on his arms, but he slips in too.

When the water warms, Lu Han ducks his head under the spray, lets water runs down his face. He doesn't say anything.

Sehun lays his hand on Lu Han's back, holds his ribcage. He feels it expand under his fingers with each breath.

"Lu Han-hyung."

He doesn't say anything, but he turns to face Sehun, slicking his blonde hair back, out of his eyes.

"Sehun," he whispers, taking Sehun by the back of his neck, tight.

They don't say anything more. Lu Han leans in and he kisses Sehun, quick and hungry, licks past his lips, but it doesn't lead to anything.

  
  
  


Sehun cradles Lu Han’s face and he smiles, eyes glazing over more. Grey clouds between them, pouring from parted pink lips. It clears, but Lu Han is already taking another drag, slowly killing the strong thrum buzzing beneath his skin.

“You’re so pretty, hyung.”

And Lu Han smiles too, laughing, fake and hollow. He quickly rolls up from his side and pushes Sehun flat onto his back, dips his head until their lips touch.

Lu Han's mouth tastes bitter.

“And I’m wasting it. My pretty face and my youth, I’m wasting it all.” He raises his eyes and glances around at the walls and then his gaze settles on Sehun again. They kiss, rough, teeth and tongue and Sehun moans into it, clutches at Lu Han because he needs him as close as he can get.

“We’ll waste our youth on each other. I’ll follow you anywhere. Just hold me tight and pull me along,” Sehun whispers, tipping his head back so Lu Han can suck and bite the skin of his neck. Already, he can feel Lu Han’s cock getting hard against his hip. The elder rolls his hips down, pushes his thigh between Sehun’s spread legs.

A ragged moan stings Sehun’s throat and he arches up.

"Hyung, come on."

"Sehun-ah, you're so beautiful."

Lu Han laughs and reaches into Sehun's sweatpants, wraps his hand around Sehun's cock loosely, drags the touch up. It's a dry friction that makes Sehun writhe against the bed, pushing up against it and twisting away from it; he moans, though, and Lu Han grins.

  
  
  


"Hyung, tell me, really, why did you come here?"

Lu Han looks at him, or rather past him, and then looks away, focuses on the wall; his brows draw in slightly.

"My mom left when I was really young and my dad hit me. After I turned eighteen, I ran off."

He looks at Sehun again, face unreadable, a very convincing mask. But Sehun reads through it and a slow smile tugs the corners of his lips upward as he laughs, gives Lu Han a shove.

"Hyung, really," Sehun insists.

Lu Han smiles then, maybe a little bitter.

"It's not important. Shouldn't you be writing?"

Sehun swats at Lu Han's shoulder, his bottom lip jutting out in a pout.

"Be quiet."

  
  
  


Sehun wakes up to Lu Han shaking him, talking to him sweetly. There's a smile on his face and something blue pinched between his fingers.

After sitting up and rubbing sleep from his eyes, he realizes it's a pill. He opens his mouth obediently, lets Lu Han press the pill to his tongue, drinks from the cup that Lu Han presses against his mouth.

"You have to write today."

They're holding hands now, both lying in their back, staring at the ceiling. Then the high seeps in and he lets go of Lu Han's hand, sits up with new energy. He hears Lu Han chuckling, looks over his shoulder and watches him roll onto his side.

"Go on."

He grins, stands up and hurries to find his notebook.

  
  
  


It won't come to him. The words dance around the edges of his mind and then dance back into the shadows, hiding away there.

At first it makes Sehun want to cry, but the more he tries, the more he forces himself to jot down little points he wants to write, the more he becomes frustrated. He presses his pen to the paper, watches the ink spill out and stain it. And, then, he takes the notebook by its spine and slings into across the room, pages noisy as they fly through the air.

Lu Han grabs his arm and gives him a tug before he can do anything else and he looks down at Lu Han, his eyes wide and shiny and wet. His chest heaves with breaths as he tries to calm down.

"Come on," Lu Han says and Sehun lets him guide him into the bathroom.

He takes his clothes off by himself, watching Lu Han as he tosses his sweater into the clothes basket, stands shivering in the cold. Bony fingers press between his own and sweet encouragement brings him under warm water and he rests heavily against the wall, the heel of his palm pressed against his temple.

Lu Han shushes him and leans up to kiss him, taking Sehun's other hand and pulling it away from his head, replacing it with his own hand.

Sehun pants when Lu Han leans back and his vision is blurry, unfocused and filled with tears. But he feels Lu Han presses kisses to his chin and then he neck and collarbone, shushing him still.

"Sehun-ah."

He's drawn out of whatever he had worked himself into and he looks at Lu Han again, swallowing back a sob, feeling it block up his throat.

Lu Han looks like he's going to say something, but he doesn't. Instead, he eases down onto his knees and kisses the soft inside of Sehun's thigh, mouths along the shaft of Sehun's soft cock. Sehun gasps, jerks at the contact, opens his mouth to speak, but he drops his head back against the wall and squeezes Lu Han's hand.

  
  
  


Drops of water fly onto the bedspread and onto Lu Han's soft flannel pants as Sehun shakes his head, slicks his hair back; Lu Han's left his own hair hanging into his eyes.

"Stop," Lu Han laughs, a genuine smile pushing his cheeks high up. And Sehun is suddenly so captivated that he can't think, can hardly breathe. He gets a shove when he stares for too long, but Lu Han offers a joint to him and he takes it.

His chest feels tight when he inhales, when Lu Han looks at him and smiles, but he thinks nothing of it and lets himself get lost in the sky filled with clouds.

  
  
  


Sehun wakes up to an overcast sky and a flurry of snow falling down. The space on the bed next to him is empty and cold, but he falls over and presses his face into Lu Han's pillow, laughs happily.

Ten minutes later, when he's still alone, he gets up out of the bed, sparing a glance out the window to the snow coming down. He snatches one of Lu Han's bigger sweaters and replaces his own with it, not minding that it's slightly too tight across his shoulders.

He wanders out of the bedroom, rubbing his eyes still, expecting to see Lu Han there on the couch or moving quietly around the kitchen. But he isn't there and Sehun's heart stops.

He tries to control his breathing, but his chest is shrinking and his lungs are swelling, breaking his ribs.

"Fuck!" He swears aloud, but it's too loud in the silence of the apartment and he startles at the sound.

Trembling all over, he retreats to the bed and hides under the covers.

  
  
  


The bed suddenly shifts, startles Sehun awake and he sits up in shock when he sees another person lying next to him. But it's Lu Han and he reaches out to Sehun shushes him and pulls him down, combs his fingers through Sehun's hair.

Sehun is calm instantly, but fighting back the emotions that surge up into his broken chest, threatening to leak through the cracks of his sternum, bleed all over Lu Han.

"Hun-ah," Lu Han whispers and Sehun chokes, sobs against Lu Han's chest, into the material of a thick sweater. He twists his fingers into the material, pulls as if he could manage to get Lu Han closer, and Lu Han doesn't stop him.

  
  
  


Sehun plops down on the couch and lies across it, rests his head in Lu Han's lap as he looks at something in his hand. He's still drowsy, closing his eyes and dozing off again until Lu Han puts a hand on his shoulder and gives him a firm shake.

"Do you want some?" Between his thumb and forefinger, he's holding two pills. They're different than the others Sehun has taken before, a dark and dull blue-gray, but he gives it little thought and nods.

They stick to his tongue and he sits up to take them, lets Lu Han tip a water bottle up for him so he can drink from it. He watches Lu Han takes a few of his own and he settles back against the couch, pushing his fingers into Sehun's thick hair.

It doesn't take long for him to start feeling it. But he's expected it to wake him up, he's expecting to feel a rush through his chest, a blur of thoughts running through his mind. Instead a warmth blooms in his chest and he is utterly taken with the feeling, the high, utterly taken with Lu Han.

He smiles up at Lu Han; Lu Han smiles too, only a little.

"Lu Han-hyung," he whispers, stretching a hand up to feel Lu Han's heartbeat against his palm.

"Sehun-ah."

  
  
  


"Do your work, Sehun-ah."

Sehun looks up to Lu Han, eyes droopy and tired, half-lidded. He whispers, "Hyung, it's hard to think."

"Should I get something to help you?"

Pouting, he nods and Lu Han stands up without another word, without an expression.

Once Sehun's loosened up and the words come to him and he smiles happily and writes.

  
  
  


_ The sun sets and he and his lover trips through the constellations, swim through galaxies, hands together and bodies pressed together. They watch starburst together, flashes of blinding white and brilliant color. He's happy, he smiles and his lover returns that smile. _

  
  
  


Sehun looks up at Lu Han through half-lidded eyes and he's suddenly full, his chest too small and tight for it all to fit. It cracks and floods through his body, clouds his mind more than the pleasure.

He reaches up and grabs Lu Han's hair, pulls until he's leaning down, until the angle is completely changed and Sehun's grip loosens; Lu Han doesn't move away.

"Lu Han!" Fingers curl around his cock and a wrist twists expertly until he's coming, his entire body tight with pleasure, crying with it. He can hear distant chuckles, feels Lu Han's hands move, hold him tighter.

There's a jerk in Lu Han's rhythm and his jaw goes slack and his head falls back and Sehun is utterly captivated.

Sehun smiles just a little, only in the corners, and he whispers, "I love you. I love you, hyung."

Lu Han doesn't react, but Sehun only thinks he didn't hear.

They kiss and Sehun smiles into it.

Love, love, love.

  
  
  


_ Love rains down on them, warm and light, brings color up into them, turns skin tan and cheeks pink. He says the words as the love rises, sloshes around, and he and his lover rise with it. Clouds gather around their heads, but they find one another and meet with summer hot kisses. _

  
  
  


Lu Han sleeps with his back facing Sehun. But Sehun doesn't mind, presses in close and kisses Lu Han's back even as he tries to squirm away from the touch.

  
  


 

Lu Han lifts the lighter up and he runs his forefinger through the flame. It doesn’t burn him and he grins at Sehun in a smug, catty way. The fire flickers as he quickly runs his finger through it again and Sehun turns away from him, finds interest in the clouds.

“Ah, shit,” Lu Han hisses, dropping his lighter and curling his fingers into a tight fist. Sehun hurries over and grabs Lu Han's wrist, gives him a tug until he's up and following him into the bathroom. The running water is loud and ice cold and Sehun pulls Lu Han's hand under it. He hisses again, through clenched teeth. He doesn't make a face though, stays blank. “Don’t worry about it, Hun-ah.”

“Shut up, hyung.” Affection spills over into Sehun’s words and he carefully touches the scorched skin. It’s red, raw, but not as bad as it could be. Lu Han jerks from the touch.

Lu Han turns to face him and pulls his hand from beneath the water, presses up close to Sehun . Their eyes meet, then their lips meet.

The water is left running, forgotten, and Lu Han takes one of Sehun's hands, pulls him back into the bedroom.

“Fuck,” Sehun gasps, arching weakly, needy, as he falls back onto the bed. The elder kisses his neck, muttering something that Sehun can’t manage to comprehend in his sudden wanton stupor.

He grabs Lu Han, his shoulder and then his back, rips his dull nails across his skin, enough to have Lu Han arching down against him. Biting marks into Sehun's flesh, Lu Han rolls against him, panting after each bruise settles into his skin.

"Hun-ah," Lu Han says, breathless, feeling up under Sehun's shirt, still wet and cold fingers tracing around his nipple. He shudders and pushes himself up to kiss Lu Han, fleeting and soft, mouth open, but a brief touch.

"Don't be slow, now, hyung. Hurry."

With a hand already working his sweatpants off his hips, Sehun gives Lu Han's chest a shove, jolting him into action. He backs up, breath heavy, fumbling with his shirt as he reaches down for the shoebox beneath the bed. The shirt hangs off one of his arms and he picks through the contents, until he's gotten what he wants.

  
  
  


Lu Han sits in the chair behind Sehun, pressed together back to chest. He rests his head against Sehun's left shoulder blade, raising his head only to inhale and exhale and lay kisses to the back of Sehun's neck.

An ache settles into the spaces between the bones of Sehun's wrist, of his knuckles, and he drops the pen onto his notebook. Lu Han bares his teeth against Sehun's neck, bites until the outline of his teeth is visible, colored purple indents in Sehun's skin. One of Lu Han's hands slide up the inside of his thigh and pushes the heel of his palm against Sehun's cock.

"Hyung," Sehun whispers, straightening up against Lu Han.

"Finish the page and then I'll take care of this."

Sehun reaches back and catches Lu Han's hand, guides it up to his mouth, so he can breathe from it too. He turns back to his writing, scans over it, frowning.

  
  
  


Water drips from Lu Han's hair onto Sehun's face as he kisses Lu Han's neck, leaves his skin stained with red. Lu Han tips his head to the side and lets Sehun kiss up higher, letting Sehun mark his skin.

"More, hyung," Sehun whispers, raising his head.

The capsule sticks to his tongue when Lu Han pushes it into his mouth and it leaves a bitter taste after he's swallowed it, an odd sticky feeling.

It takes later, Sehun's not exactly sure when, but he's still kissing Lu Han when it does. Pale skin of a trembling stomach is red and purple, harsh bruises of teeth and tingles of plush kisses. Lu Han smokes while he kisses down further, chokes and coughs and laughs when Sehun wraps his lips around the tip of his cock.

  
  
  


"I love you," Sehun whispers, lips pressed under the curve of Lu Han's jaw.

Lu Han does say it back. Instead, he fondly says, "Hun-ah."

And the love is so apparent that Sehun doesn't need it, he doesn't think he'll ever need to hear Lu Han say it as long as Lu Han says his name like that.

  
  
  


"Go write."

Sehun whines, his face in Lu Han's neck, "But hyung."

Slipping his hands up under Lu Han's sweater, Sehun slides his thumbs past nipples, feels along the elder's sides. He kisses Lu Han's neck, but it doesn't succeed in distracting him; Lu Han presses his hands against Sehun's shoulders and gives him a gentle shove. The smile Lu Han wears is faint, his eyes not holding the same joy.

He pushes Sehun's hair out of his eyes and Sehun preens under the attention, presses closer again.

"No, you have to write." The disappointment on Lu Han's face makes Sehun shrink back. "You need to be away from distractions, go write in the kitchen."

Sehun lets out a whine, slumping now.

"I'll be here when you get back.”

  
  
  


"Hyung," Sehun whispers, his arms slung over Lu Han's shoulders, his thighs aching as he lifts himself and then drops back down on Lu Han's cock. He shakes with effort, bouncing shallowly.

Lu Han curls his hand around Sehun's cock, strokes him quickly, almost too fast, until he's shuddering and coming all over both of them. With both hands, Lu Han takes Sehun by the hips and forces him down into several more rapid thrusts, his own body jerking with pleasure.

  
  
  


There's a pleasant feeling in Sehun's chest, an odd happiness that warms him as if he was a child again, standing out in a warm summer rain. He can feel Lu Han's stare and when he looks over he can see the love in Lu Han's eyes, can feel the love.

"Hyung, you shouldn't stare," he chastises, playfully, grinning from ear to ear. Lu Han smiles, laughs a little, but he doesn't say anything, doesn't do anything other raise the joint up to his lips again and look away, out the open window.

A breeze blows in and Lu Han shivers, pulling his sleeve down around his free hand. Sehun doesn't feel cold though.

  
  
  


"A little more," Lu Han says, glancing at the page Sehun's writing.

Sehun has been writing all morning, all day it feels like. He can't seem to write, can't even fill half the page. There's a measly two and half paragraphs across the top of the page.

"Alright, hyung." He loosely clutches his pen, shaking it slightly as he thinks. Lu Han turns to leave him, to fall back into bed, but he lingers in the doorway. Without looking, Sehun chuckles, says matter of factly, "Hyung, you're staring again."

Sehun looks back in time to see Lu Han flash a faint smile. "No, I wasn't, I was just leaving."

Sehun is left alone in the room, with only a ghost of Lu Han's love with him, but it's enough.

  
  
  


"I'm sorry," Lu Han says quietly and it takes a few seconds before it sinks in and he understand what Lu Han said. He thinks about it quietly, trying to figure out what Lu Han is apologizing for, but his thoughts are muddled and he looks at Lu Han, brows furrowed.

"Why are you apologizing?"

At first Lu Han looks like he might actually answer Sehun, but then he shakes his head slightly and looks away from him, gaze roving the ceiling above them. Sehun doesn't push it.

  
  
  


Sehun looks down at the empty page and he sighs, drags his fingers across the surface. A year ago, he would have written several pages by now, driven by passion and heartache. But, now, he can hardly think straight, he can hardly think of anything other than Lu Han.

Although, it is particularly hard not to be thinking about Lu Han when he's draped across the back of Sehun's chair, kissing Sehun's neck, rubbing his shoulders.

"Maybe you should go home for a few days, Hun-ah," Lu Han suggests, kissing him more now; he only succeeds in making Sehun's head more cloudy.

"Do you want me to leave? Are you sick of me now?" It's playful, Sehun's grinning, but some mixed up expression flashes across Lu Han's face before he gets it. He laughs at Sehun then.

"I'm not sick of you, I just think it would be good if you went away from me for a while."

Sehun turns to look at him, "I don't think that would make me think about you less."

"Try it. Try it for me." Lu Han kisses his head, whispers in his hair, "and for yourself."

  
  
  


Home doesn't feel like home anymore. It's too quiet and too empty and always cold no matter how high the heat is turned up. Anxiety and paranoia crawl from the shadows and burrow in Sehun's chest, rattle around in his lungs and poke at his heart, taunt it until it beats quick from fright.

He doesn't write much. He writes a few lines before his hands are shaking to badly for his writing to be legible.

He gives up on the night of the first day.

  
  
  


_ Being without his lover is like being without air, being without warmth in a blizzard, being without water in a blazing desert. His lungs begin to collapse and his fingertips turn blue and his body grows weak. _

  
  
  


The ramen in his cabinets tastes stale, he leaves them all there and falls back into bed.

He doesn't get out of bed again and it's only the second day. That night he lies in bed, awake all night, staring at the ceiling and thinking only of Lu Han.

He knew it wouldn't help him write.

  
  
  


_ Dark clouds roll in and lightning disrupts his calm skies and rumbling thunder frightens him. He crashes to earth and is drenched in freezing rain, his lover nowhere in sight to lift him up and comfort him. _

  
  
  


Just before the sun begins setting on the third day, Sehun springs from bed and he rushes to the door, opens and closes it quietly despite his hurry. He doesn't knock first, he opens Lu Han's door and quietly walks in, craning his neck as he looks around.

The bedroom door is pushed against the frame, but not closed and he can hear Lu Han moving around, catches the sound of something being dropped. He hesitates just before pushing it open, his hand open, but he stops and considers just turning back; he's been quiet enough that Lu Han might not have heard him at all.

The door opens before he makes up his mind and Lu Han stands there, looking mildly surprised. His arm falls back to his side and his expression flattens out, then, he merely murmurs, "Sehun-ah."

A certain feeling of calmness surrounds Sehun and he steps forward and kisses Lu Han; he reciprocates very little.

"I missed you," Sehun explains, sneaky little smile working its way up.

Lu Han opens his mouth, looking far away behind Sehun. When he closes his mouth and looks back up to Sehun, he steps back and to the side.

Sehun looks into the room, smiling still until he spots the suitcase on the bed. His happiness fades in the blink of an eye and he looks over to Lu Han, well on his way to panic-stricken.

"Where are you going?"

Lu Han hesitates for just a minute.

"I'm going to back to China." Sehun's heart falls into his stomach, burns. The flutter of panic is strong in his chest and he sways in place, reaching for something to hold onto; he leans against the door frame instead of reaching for Lu Han. His heart races, hitting hard against his sternum as if to break free and leave his body. It swells and presses the air from his lungs, makes it nearly impossible for him to drag in more.

"When are you coming back?"

Lu Han steps closer to him, whispers, "Sehun-ah, I'm sorry."

Tears sting Sehun's eyes, but he looks up anyway, knowing they'll roll down his cheeks. Lu Han makes no expression when the first of the tears race down Sehun's cheeks, but he looks pained as more come down.

"Were you going to tell me or were you just going to disappear and leave me?"

"I was going to tell you. Of course I was going to." Lu Han won't look at him now and Sehun's not entirely sure he can believe him.

"Hyung, I need you. I need you to stay with me."

"No, I need to leave. I  _ have _ to leave."

Sehun rushes the last few paces between himself and Lu Han and he takes Lu Han by the sides of his face, kisses him, lips hardly parted and tears drying on Lu Han's cheeks.

"Please, hyung."

"I can't. I told you that I'd break you." Lu Han's eyes are glassy with tears, but he tips his head back slightly, blinks them away. No tears streak his cheeks, but Sehun's crying silently still, stunned. Lu Han takes a step back, grabs the suitcase from the edge of the bed and starts to walk past him.

"Lu Han-hyung." He's choking, sobs aching in his throat and more tears falling down his cheeks. His hands tremble. "Hyung, please, don't."

Lu Han pushes his hands away, shakes his head, calmer than Sehun is; he is reaching out, shaking his head frantically, sobbing.

"I can't stay with you." Lu Han steps back again, further this time. "Sehun, I can't. I'm leaving now. And I want you to go home, I want you to forget about me."

Sehun shakes his head, sobs out Lu Han's name even as Lu Han is rejecting him. His breaths come suddenly quicker together, one hardly leaving before he's trying to suck another in, because he can't catch his breath.

The front door is wide open and he can see the bright flickering lights shining in the hallway; the wavering of the light makes him shake more. A silhouette of Lu Han stands in the middle of the light, he stays there, scraping the toe of his shoe across the floor.

"Goodbye, Sehun," he says suddenly and Sehun's head snaps up, breaths just as shattered and uneven as before. Lu Han isn't there anymore. Sehun stumbles forward, still sobbing, but tears don't streak his cheeks anymore.

He wants Lu Han. He needs Lu Han. He needs Lu Han to make him feel normal, needs Lu Han to make him feel safe and loved, needs the comfort of Lu Han sleeping next to him, needs the stability Lu Han brought him. And he said all of that, but Lu Han is still leaving him.

He holds onto the frame of the front door and he peers down the hall, but Lu Han is already gone, footsteps already faded. Part of him wants to follow along, wants to wrap around Lu Han. But he doesn't. He takes one last look into Lu Han's apartment and then steps back, jerks the door shut; he still jumps when it slams.

In the cold hallway, with the clear white light flickering above him, his heart falls to ground and breaks and he doesn't bother to pick up the pieces.

  
  
  


The sky clouds over, turns a stormy grey, but it’s Sehun’s eyes that rain.

Soft blue drains and slate grey takes its place. Tears fall down his cheek and land on his fingertips.

  
  
  


He's suffocating. He's sure of it.

His lungs are caving in and anxiety is flooding them. He's drowning.

He curls up tight, his legs in his chest and struggles. His hands clench, sweat, and he pulls his arms in close to his body.

Anxiety sloshes around inside him, floods past his lungs, fills up to the brim and spills from his eyes. His cheeks tingle and he sobs, gasps for breath because that's instinct, it's all he knows to do.

  
  
  


This moment will never end, this feeling will never leave him. He's sure of it. He's sure he'll never get rid of the the dread flooding his insides, he won't ever get rid of the tickle around his heart, the urge to scream lingering in the hollow of his throat.

He throws himself down in bed and he cries, sobs, lets the feelings bleed from him, but the wound doesn't coagulate and then heal over, it just keeps bleeding.

  
  
  


The world is dark for him again and thoughts race through his mind. He can't even really read them, they're moving too quickly, darting through his mind and then hiding from him when he tries to make sense of them.

It's okay, though. He doesn't really want to know what they are or what they mean.

He doesn't want to think at all.

  
  
  


Everything's closing in on him. His apartment is quiet and cold and the walls are shrinking. He takes in deep breaths, forces himself to breathe, but his head head spins and his vision is spotted with black.

He welcomes the weakness that comes over him, welcomes everything.

  
  
  


It's all so bright. His thoughts, the sky, the light that shine in from his bare window. Everything is too bright and he can't manage to sleep.

He stares at his laptop for hours, thoughts running. Then he stands up and he opens it, reads the last line he wrote.

_ His heart bursts with the colors of joy and love. _

Bitter tears roll down his cheeks, but he laughs.

He starts writing, but he only manages to get down a few words before his mind is everywhere and nowhere again. The tears turn sad, angry, he screams and cries until his neighbors bang the walls and the ceiling; then he stops and he stares at the blank ceiling.

  
  
  


His hair shines with oils, hangs over his forehead and down into his eyes, but he doesn't care. All the marks Lu Han had last left on him have faded and he presses his nails into the soft skin of his neck, scrapes them downwards, scratches lines onto his hip. Tears roll down his cheeks.

The shadows under each of his ribs reminds him of Lu Han, of the thinness of his body. His hips jut out sharply now and his shoulders and collarbones. He touches them and laughs, bitter and harsh in the quiet; he practically startles himself.

He burns away the memories with hot water and gets lost in the fog of steam.

  
  
  


The next day, he stands over the stove and boils ramen. But he's reminded of Lu Han after he starts to eat it and he abandons the food, throws himself down in front of the toilet, retching.

  
  


 

He lays in bed, the heat turned off completely, struggling to stay warm under only one blanket, but it feels like home, so he lies there all night until finally he's too exhausted to keep his eyes open.

  
  
  


The thoughts stop and for once he's at peace and then he remembers his laptop, the thoughts wake up from their slumber. But they don't run through his mind, they stand from the shadows and amble forward one-by-one.

He cries. Cries from the moment he sits down and starts typing. But it's better than all that he has been feeling.

_ His new lover sees him through swirling grey and they rise into the sky together, trip over clouds happily, together, chasing after one another. Their feet touch the ground again and then his back meets the ground too and he lays himself out to be ruined. _

_ He doesn't think he's able to be ruined, though. His lover wouldn't, couldn't. _

_ He was invisible, not glass, not broken by falls from up high. _

  
  
  


That night he curls up on his side and cries into his pillow, all bitterness and false hopes of Lu Han returning gone.

The name is a knife, lances the skin over his heart open, digs down into his sternum and then pushes its way into his heart, tears it all up.

  
  
  


_ Dew dampens his wings. _

_ No, it's not dew. It's a downpour of rain. The heavens split and spill down on him, soak him to the bone and he shivers as he tumbles down. He lands, hard, bent awkwardly, splayed out and broken. _

Sehun smiles at his own writing; his cheeks are tight from tears.

  
  
  


It's 11:20pm. The date is January 21, 2016. Sehun marks it precisely.

There's two bottles of soju sitting on the desk beside him. One is empty and the other is halfway gone.

Sehun saves his writing. Then he saves it three more times, obsessively. He smiles, raises the bottle up to his mouth again, finishes it off.

His story is finally finished.

He stumbles to bed and dives beneath the covers, a feeling of satisfaction cooling around his soul.

  
  
  


Alcohol warms him. Alcohol warms him all the way down deep in his belly and then creeps through his limbs, rise hot in his cheeks. Alcohol is what he goes out to drink to celebrate the publishing of his first book.

He sits all alone on a barstool, his only company the bartender that tops off his drinks and tries to talk him into doing shots. It's dark and stuffy, someone is chain-smoking on the far right end of the bar.

But it's a comfort, clouds his head enough that he doesn't have to think about Lu Han. He doesn't have to wonder if the things he did with Lu Han were just dreams or if they really happened. Maybe he'll never know.

Maybe he's alright with that now.

Everything in his head goes quiet and he listens to the quiet music in the bar, breathes in dingy smoke filled air. He's been here twice just this week and an uncountable amount of times in the past month. When he'd come in tonight, the bartender greeted him with a wave and his name, a smile.

He comes here when it's all too much and he feels stress winding around his neck and pulling tight. The alcohol warms him and grounds him, clouds his head, but makes him focus on nothing.

And he's not focusing, not thinking. At least he's not thinking about how he has to go home and read more emails from his editor, Baekhyun, gushing about his style and then cursing him for the way he constructed one scene or another.

But he is thinking about what's left in his glass, he glances down to it, wondering if he should just tip it back and then go home or drink another.

He ends up tipping it back, but he doesn't get up to go home.

He feels the weight of a stare and he lifts his head, glances right and left, and then he notices a man sitting on the far left end of the bar. The stranger's eyes are sharp and dark, but his hair is bleached white blonde. Sehun thinks he's attractive, more so than any other man in the bar.

The stranger smiles, lip corners curling and showing a flash of teeth.

Sehun smiles back, watches the man stand up and begin to walk toward him, but he looks away as the man draws nearer. He sits beside Sehun and a nervous flutter forms in Sehun's chest, makes him want to shiver.

"I'm Zitao," he says and Sehun looks over, probably looking amusingly startled because Zitao chuckles at him; it makes Sehun smile a little and he looks away so it will fade some, so he can straighten his thoughts.

When he looks at Zitao again, he smiles, whispers, "Sehun."

**Author's Note:**

>   
>  start: August 23, 2015  
> finished: January 21, 2016  
> 11:20 p.m.


End file.
